Ten men RCF hold Union Bank of India

by Kaushal Shukla October 4, 2015

Ten men Rashtriya Chemicals & Fertilizers (RCF) held firm to deny Union Bank of India the win and hold them to a 0-0 draw in an Elite Division game of the Mumbai District Football Association (MDFA) at Cooperage on Sunday afternoon.

Union Bank of India dominated the first half in terms of possession, but lacked the quality to make their dominance count. RCF were much better in the second half despite being reduced to ten men and did enough to hold UBI.

UBI started the game brightly as they enjoyed a good spell of possession early on and also had a decent tempo to their game, but the Bankers failed to create any kind of clear cut goal scoring opportunities.

The referee put a scrappy and drab first half to a close as both the goalkeepers went into the interval having been heavily underworked.

Like UBI did in the first half, RCF started the second half well but suffered a major blow, when RCF’s Kuldeep Mashi got his marching orders after a late tackle on a UBI player earned him a second bookable offence in the 65th minute of the game.

RCF coach A.J. Patrick responded by substituting Kenneth D’Psena by Jagdidh Magdada six minutes later.

RCF nearly edged in front in the 75th minute Arvind Khanojiya’s header from a corner was cleared off the line by UBI’s Calton D’Mello.

It was a huge scare for UBI who were failing to make the numerical advantage count RCF came closest of the two teams to score the opening goal.

UBI coach Julian D’Silva threw Ramesh Singh on in the 86th minute as UBI chased the winner in the dying minutes.

UBI’s Mrunal Tandel had a great chance to clinch the points in the penultimate minute of the game after he fired his shot from eight yards out straight to the goalkeeper after Shravan Shetty had done well to pick him out with a cutback.

UBI missed another glorious opportunity a minute later, when UBI’s Nasicmento Santiago too picked out the goalkeeper after some intricate play from UBI at the edge of the box saw him go through on goal

RCF survived the late UBI surge to collect their first point of the season. RCF dished out good second half show to deny UBI from taking all three points after they were reduced to ten men

UBI ended the game strongly but left it too late in the end and had to settle for a point.