Atletico Austin
Gladiators United
Atletico Austin secures the Semi-final spot
Gladiators United needed their Gladiators to stand tall and crush Atleticos to pave their way to the semi-final. It was always going to be difficult without Gladiator’s playmaker, Maher. However, when Gladiators saw the wall of Atleticos, Wali wasn’t on the pitch, the glimpse of hope sparkled at the start of the match!
Atleticos didn’t take long to shake up the hopes of Gladiators as the match began. Despite the absence of Wali, Atletico Austin set up a very attacking formation on the pitch. Pushing Niraf and Sazal up front, Atleticos pulled Upal to the midfield to assist Captain Abu Masud, Kollol and Tomal! Khwaja was pushed back to the defense to lead the defensive line with Neon, Sohel and Ilias. Zarif was given the license to play all over the pitch to make the best use of his energy.
On the other hand, Gladiators, desperate for a big win, also formed an attacking formation. Pushing Sabbir and Austin’s prolific striker, Arshad up front. They formed a quartet at the midfield with Raihan, Shafiur, Dip and Pankaj. Gladiators had Austin’s one of the best defenders, Gladiator Abu Sohel at the defense along with veteran Rezwan, Farhan, Anam and the new find, Nuruzzaman. For whatever reason, one of the strong defenders, Zahid Rahman was not found on the pitch!
The game started at a fast pace as both the teams played attacking football. Raihan, Shafiur, Sabbir, and Dip advanced to feed the ball to Arshad who is known for position sense and his scoring ability with both feet. Gladiators got into business early on, building their attacks sometimes through right via Sabbir and sometimes through center with Shafiur and Raihan. Many times, Sabbir and Shafiur were seen trying to break through the defensive mid of Atleticos. But most of their attacks were ending outside the D-box of Atleticos. After the brisk start, Atleticos slowly took the control of the midfield. Niraf, Abu Masud, Tomal, Upal – all orchestrated the attacks that kept Gladiators’ defense busy. The midfield fed a ball to completely unmarked Sazal, who somehow managed to kick the ball outside the post from a close range. On another occasion, Nuruzzaman turned into Gladiator, ‘Russel Crowe’ and saved an almost goal from the goal line. Nuruzzaman is one of the finds of the tournament in defense this year.
Gladiators were not sitting idle! They counter-attacked with long balls and used the gaps in the midfield as Atleticos were playing all out. Shafiur, Dip, Raihan and Sabbir built up an excellent counter-attack, and broke through the Atletico’s defense. Shafiur almost found keeper, Tasneem in 1:1 position; as Shafiur took the ultimate kick, Upal ran down from the midfield and somehow deflected the ball away and Tasneem kept Atleticos out of danger. Towards the end of the first half, Gladiator defender, Abu Sohel got a hamstring pull and was forced out of the pitch. First half of the match ended at 0-0.
Beginning of the second half, Atleticos started pressing more searching for a goal. Captain Abu Masud took the opportunity of Abu Sohel’s absence and fed a ball to Niraf who made no mistake sending the ball back of the net, 1-0 for Atleticos! Conceding a goal, Gladiators went all out since their equation had gotten more difficult. From a consolidated attack through left, Gladiators got a foul outside the D-Box. Experienced Sabbir took an excellent free kick and intelligent Shafiur was able to back-head, just enough to deflect the ball away from the experienced keeper, Tasneem, 1-1; Gladiators equalized! Right after the equalizing goal, there was a phase Gladiators attacked looking for the second goal. By that time, Tomal who was playing as a center midfielder, dropped back and neutralized the attacks. Keeper Tasneem along with the defense led by Khwaja kept the team out of danger.
At the other end, Niraf was unstoppable! If keeper Shantanu wasn’t there, Gladiators would have conceded couple of goals. Shantanu stood tall and made some excellent saves that could be used for training the young goalkeepers. However, Niraf was in too good of a rhythm to be stopped. Unmarked Sazal fed an excellent ball to Niraf who scored a classic goal with his right foot, 2-1 for Atleticos. Gladiators tried the remainder of the game, but it was a monumental task for them to overturn Atleticos without their top picks, Maher and Abu Sohel on the pitch. It was an excellent match full of attacking football from both teams. It could have been different if Maher was available. But at the end, Niraf made the difference, as he always does!