ATK Mohun Bagan kept their nerves in a closely contested Indian Super League final to beat Bengaluru FC 4-3 on penalties to win their first title in Goa on Saturday. In a game that ended 2-2 in regular time, ATKMB’s Dimitri Petratos scored all three penalties he took the night before Vishal Kaith’s save of Bruno Ramires’ in the shootout brought them one step closer. Bengaluru FC’s Pablo Perez then sent his penalty kick over the crossbar as the Mariners sealed the result in a game where they had upset Bengaluru FC from the start. Bengaluru FC was forced to bring Sunil Chhetri early on after Sivasakthi Narayanan was carried off in the opening seconds of the game.
Things went further off plan in the 13th minute as Krishna handled the ball from a Petratos corner kick as ATKMB were awarded a penalty. Petratos completed the job from the spot to put his team ahead.
ATKMB used this advantage to put pressure on Bengaluru FC, who received a plethora of yellow cards on the field and one off for head coach Simon Grayson.
But in the last minute of stoppage time of the first half, they got a way back when Bose missed the ball and made contact with Krishna during an attempted clearance. Chhetri stepped up to take the penalty and sent Kaith the wrong way to restore parity.
In the final quarter of the match, Rohit’s shot from the edge of the box set up a series of corners before a deflection found Krishna at the far post and the striker nodded home in the 78th minute.
But five minutes from time, the game was level again. On the edge of the Bengaluru FC penalty area, Kiyan Nassiri went down after a push from Perez as ATKMB won their second penalty of the night. Petratos was ready to score again.
In the third minute of stoppage time, Asish Rai’s goal bound shot was cleared off the line by Prabir Das. Moments later, Colaco and Nassiri almost scored together, but Bruno Ramires provided the crucial interception as the game went into extra time.
Udanta Singh and Rohit failed to hit the target in their respective overtime attempts, while Manvir missed by a few yards for ATKMB.
Towards the end of extra time, Sandhu spilled Petratos’ long-range strike, but it bounced off for a corner kick that came to naught before the game went to penalties.
In the nerve-wracking penalty shoot-out, Golden Glove winner Kaith came on for his team’s second game in a row, with no one missing from the spot in a game that was dictated by penalties throughout.
As the winners, ATKMB took home a prize money of Rs 6 crore, while the runners-up Bengaluru FC received Rs 2.5 crore.
(This story has not been edited by DailyExpertNews staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
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