KOLKATA: The solitary goal, which came on the cusp of halftime at a packed Salt Lake Stadium on Sunday and helped ATK Mohun Bagan extend their winning run against East Bengal to five matches since their merger, encapsulated the quintessence of the latest clash between the two traditional rivals.
Adding one derby win that Mohun Bagan had before the merger with ATK, would make it six on the trot. With seconds to go before the break, ATKMB earned a corner and Liston Colaco whipped in a curler. Brazilian Eliandro and Sumeet Passi - who were given the task of leading the red-and-gold brigade's attacking line in a 4-4-2 formation - dropped back to deal with the threat. What happened next was a bizarre chain of events. Eliandro, standing at the first post, tossed his right foot in the air and missed the ball completely.
It took Passi, standing behind him, by surprise and instead of clearing the danger, he ended up pushing the ball into the net. Eliandro and Passi were supposed to score at the other end but Emami East Bengal's two forwards played the decisive part in handing ATKMB the advantage and eventually a much-needed 1-0 win, bolstering survival chances for Juan Ferrando's side in the ongoing Durand Cup.
To make it more memorable for Mohun Bagan fans, the green-and-maroon side has now beaten the city rivals for a record-breaking sixth match running across different tournaments, a run which began with on January 19 in 2020 in I-League before the two city sides migrated to ISL assuming new identities. East Bengal's five-match winning run against Mohun Bagan took place in pre-independent India, between 1941 and 1943. For present-day East Bengal, it was another frustrating evening as they failed to score in three matches on the trot, virtually going out of the season-opening tournament with a whimper.
The red-and-gold team's coach Stephen Constantine predictably started with a defensive set-up, perhaps knowing that his team was not ready to match the vision and vibrancy of the likes of Joni Kauko, Hugo Boumous and Colaco. This set a pattern as far as flow of the game was concerned. Boumous and Kauko were perfectly placed to weave various attacking intricacies.
But they were all possession and little penetration because of essentially two factors: First, just like East Bengal, Ferrando's side too lacked the cutting edge in the attacking third and Colaco's role as a centre-forward was nothing but a makeshift one and, secondly, East Bengal's key to containing them was suffocation, denying them space. As a consequence, the first derby in the city in more than two years never rose to a spectacle.
It was only after the break and after conceding their first goal in three matches, East Bengal started becoming adventurous. Cleyton Silva and Aniket Yadav's arrival in place of Eliandro and Jerry Lalrinzuala gave them the impetus. But Ferrando's side should have gone 2-0 up when Spanish defender Ivan Gonzalez lost the ball inside the box and left Colaco with the space and time to punish. But East Bengal goalkeeper Kamaljit Singh denied him with a spectacular save.
ATKMB came calling with renewed vigour and Florentin Pogba ventured out and saw his shot cleared on the line by East Bengal's Cypriot defender Charalambos Kyriacou.
