JOIN USTolgay Ozbey and East Bengal demolished the Aircraftmen 8-1 to bounce back admirably from a 0-1 defeat to arch-rivals Mohun Bagan, and send HASC to depths previously unknown. Australian Ozbey was the star, netting four times with Ugo Okpara adding a brace while Robin Singh and Baljit Sahni completed the tally. A Hamza struck the consolation goal for HASC from the spot.
With the win, East Bengal climbed up to third with 13 points from seven matches while winless HASC stay rock bottom with a solitary point.
“I have nothing much to say. It was just a really bad defensive effort from us today,” said M Muralidharan, HASC manager. “We expected it to be difficult, but not anything like this,” he added. Even before the start, everyone knew Ozbey would be the man the home side will need to keep quiet. As the game began, however, it became clear that it would be easier said than done.
Ozbey used the width of the pitch to great effect, winning corners and whipping in crosses at will in the first half. But the first goal of the game was gifted by HASC. Joseph Femi, under pressure from rival players, gave a backpass to goalkeeper Amar Deb, who lingered too long with the ball, allowing Robin to take the ball off him and knock it into an empty net.
Parity was restored soon after when Hamza converted a penalty after he was impeded inside the box by Robert Lathlamuana. But that goal was pretty much the last sniff the home side had at the opponent’s goal. Central defender Okpara made it 3-1 scoring two goals in the space of ten minutes in the 26th and 36th, both of them finishes a forward would have been extremely proud of.
Ozbey got onto the scoresheet, four minutes into the second half, with a calm and composed strike. The Australian latched onto a nice through ball from Penn Orji to place it easily past Deb. Ozbey then scored his second and EB’s fifth all on his own with a low left-footed piledriver into the corner in the 59th.
He completed his hat-trick in the 71st, taking advantage of a mistake by substitue Ramesh to round the goalkeeper and slot into an empty net. Sahni, coming in for Sanju Pradhan, made it 7-1 soon after with his first touch. But the credit for the goal should go to Ozbey, who made a slaloming run from halfline, going past HASC defenders like they didn’t exist, to put it on a plate for Sahni. Ozbey ended the Bangalore side’s misery four minutes from time, rising highest to head in a cross from Robin.
“We probably could have had more. But at the end of the day, it was important that we won,” East Bengal coach Trevor Morgan said. “It is, however, horrible to see your opponents capitulate like that. But then a football game must have a winner and a loser.”