By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, Sep 26: St. Patrick’s High School, Gumla, Jharkhand defended their title in the 62nd Subroto Cup Junior (U 17) Girls Inter School International Football Tournament defeating G.S.S.S Alakhpura, Bhiwani, Haryana 3-0 in an exciting final played here at the Dr.B.R Ambedkar Stadium. Anita Dungdung scored twice while Shaulina Dang scored the third for the winners. Air Marshal A.P Singh PVSM, AVSM, Vice Chief of the Air Staff, was the Chief Guest, presented the trophy to the winning team.
St. Patrick’s shocked the Haryana defence within seconds of the start of the match, with Anita Dungdung finding the early goal to give a perfect start for the defending champions.
They doubled the lead minutes later through Shaulina Dang. Anita’s shot was saved by Haryana goalkeeper Manisha, but the ball fell kindly for Shaulina who calmly finished for the second goal.
The school from Jharkhand were dominating the possession and were looking the better side, as G.S.S.S Haryana found it difficult to find any footing in the match.
St. Patrick’s scored their third goal to give them a comfortable position in the match. Riya Verma found Anita in the right wing through one of her angled balls.
Anita’s left footer found the goal, giving the Haryana keeper no chances.
Alpha Kandulna could have added a fourth before half time but her effort, dribbling past three defenders, came back off the crossbar.Haryana started the second half better moving the ball forward with better precision.
They came close to scoring from a corner, but Rishika’s effort came back off the crossbar.
There were no clear cut chances for either teams as Jharkhand maintained possession and ensured that the title will be back in their school for one more year.
A total of 32 teams including a team from Bangladesh participated in the Junior Girls (U 17) category of this edition’s Subroto Cup. For the first time in the girl’s category, a team from Jammu and Kashmir, DNRM G.G.H.S.S Poonch participated in the tournament.