JOIN USASC join MEG at the top after easy win
ASC, who romped to their sixth win from nine matches, have 19 points, though their goal difference of 21 is inferior to MEG’s 23. Dharmaraja are languishing one place from the bottom with a mere five points from nine games.
Apart from Thyagarajan’s strikes in the 6th minute and early in stoppage time, ASC’s other goals came in the 88th minute through Jotin Singh and substitute A Saikh in the third minute of injury time.
The Armymen opened their account after Jotin made a superb run and took a shot inside the box running from the left. The ball came back off the post but Thyagarajan was quick to slot the rebound home.
For Dharmaraja, Sanju and Ravibabu made some manoeuvres to keep the ASC defence guessing, but did not threaten the goal. Largely through Jotin and Thyagarajan, it was ASC who kept dictating terms for most of the first half.
There was some drama midway through the second half when, in the 74th minute, Dharmaraja custodian Hariharan was shown the red card and sent off for coming out of the box and handling the ball to stop the charge of Thirunvukarasu. Substitute Dilip, who replaced Madan in the 35th minute, came in to man the goal since the team did not have a substitute ‘keeper.
Jotin made no mistake in the 88th minute upon receiving a through ball from Raghu Kumar when he dribbled past couple of defenders to put it past Dilip and make it 2-0.
Thyagarajan then struck one minute into injury time off a pass from substitute Karthik, and Saikh finished the game off in the dying moments, smashing a right-footer off a Raghu pass inside the box.
Other results: ‘B’ Division: RBI: 0 drew Bangalore Kickers: 0; Minerva: 3 (Amar 9th, Jipen Haldar 40th, Dinesh 65th) bt Young Muslims: 1 (Angelo 14th).