MUMBAI, NOV 7: The Festival of Lights failed to provide the sparkle at the Cooperage on Sunday. Two matches of the Bristol Rovers Cup football tournament between high-profile sides ended in draws this evening.Mahindras kept themselves in the race for a semi-final spot from Group B when they earned their second draw, against Churchill Brothers. Earlier, Bengal Mumbai FC and FC Kochin produced big yawns owing to minimal action in a goalless fare.FC Kochin, like Mahindras, are also in the fray, and in the final league matches, they play Churchill; Mahindras lock horns with BMFC. Whoever wins by a bigger margin is likely to make the grade.Churchill, who were so inept in their match against BMFC, showed plenty of purpose. Strikers Francis Silveira and Marcus Carvalho looked threatening and with Oscar Hunda showing more enterprise in midfield, Churchill were the better side.Only in the final 20 minutes did Mahindras come into reckoning. That period saw them score the equaliser.Churchill's right flankwas very active in the first half with right-back Denzie Ferrao overlapping. Mahindras were using a flat back five system(!), mid-fielder Khalid Siddique playing as a left-wing back.The Mahindras goal nearly fell with Churchill stopper Osumanu Hussain's powerful header off a corner. Mahindras goalkeeper S Rajan had foolishly left his charge and only a goalline save from Aqueel Ansari saved the local side from going a goal down. Aqueel, in the end, turned out to be Mahindras' hero.There was more action from the Churchill side with Francis forcing Rajan to tip off a right-foot volley. At the other end, Manjit Singh forced a brilliant diving save from Edward Ensah.The Mahindras goal fell in the first minute of the second half off a flag-kick. Osumanu headed towards Mario Soares to nod it in.Mahindras took their time to find their attack and when they found the rhythm, it was Aqueel who scored from a move started by Shamsi Raza, who lobbed for Nitin Pradhan to provide the pass. Aqueel saw plenty ofaction today. He was the only midfielder who kept feeding Manjit and Abbas Rizvi despite the team back-pedalling in the first half.TOOTHLESS: BMFC had virtually no tooth today. They hardly carried any threats to the FC Kochin goal. So much so that Kochin left-stopper Jo Paul Anchery was pushing forward in the last half hour. It was an insipid match. FC Kochin, despite having the guns in IM Vijayan and Gunabir Singh, did not carry too many threats to trouble the BMFC back four.With Tapon Ghosh having another good game for BMFC and Sagar Amin shadowing Vijayan well, the action brought mostly yawns from the sparse gathering.
