Goemkarponn desk
PANAJI: In the National Games 2023 Women’s Football category, Haryana and Odisha have already secured semi-final tickets from Group A. So today’s match was just a formality for the Goa team. Goa football team beat Chandigarh 3-1 in the last match of their group.
Flani Costa, Karishma Purushottam Shirvoikar and Remediana Socorina Noronha scored for Goa. On the other hand, Vedika Gulia scored the only goal for Chandigarh.
The crowd of school students to watch Goa’s last match at Tilak Maidan was eye-catching. From the very start of the game, the Goa team played amazing football.
Just 3 minutes into the match, Aniela Barretto made a pass to Flani Costa from the left wing. The chance-seeker striker made no mistake in scoring the first goal in the bottom left corner. Chandigarh football team could hardly play for the first 30 minutes.
Goa’s second goal was scored in the 24th minute of the match when Karishma Purushottam Shirvoikar cut into the box with the ball and finished into the top corner. Right after that, the Chandigarh team wobbled a bit but couldn’t make much of it.
After 31 minutes of the game, defender Remediana made it 3-0 with a beautiful header from a corner. Goan coach Joao Mimino Rebello made two changes at the start of the second half. He brought Arpita Yeshwant and Merecia Franska Tavares in place of Rhea Pires and Aniela Barretto.
And on the other hand the Chandigarh coach substituted their team captain and experienced defender Yati Mehta and brought forward Vedika Gulia at half-time.
It was a completely different Chandigarh team in the second half. Goa was almost not allowed to play.
The Chandigarh team kept on pressing harder. The Goa team started losing the ball in the middle. At the 64 minutes of the game the substitute Vedika Gulia calmly placed the ball in the goal by beating the advanced Goan goalkeeper Ashika Gadekar who came out of her line and scoring the only consolation goal for Chandigarh.
In the very last minutes of the game, the Goan goalkeeper again made a mistake by leaving the goal, but this time the Chandigarh football team could not do anything from that mistake.
The last match of the National Games saw Goa’s team earn some respect by defeating Chandigarh and Odisha and Haryana advanced to the next round from Group A.
