ATK Mohun Bagan FC held West Ham United FC to a 1-1 draw on the Reliance Corporate Park (RCP) in Navi Mumbai on Wednesday within the opening fixture of the Reliance Foundation presents Premier League Next Generation Cup. The third-place occupants of the recently-concluded Reliance Foundation Development League (RFDL) have been inside touching distance of taking away three factors from this recreation. However, a late purpose by the Hammers’ substitute Favour Fawunmi ensured that the incumbent FA Youth Cup champions walked away with some extent from this recreation.

The Mariners began off positively as they did not peg again and took the sport to the opposition proper from the start. They have been organised sufficient to thwart assaults on the again and frequently made inroads into the West Ham defence by initiating some incisive passing patterns via the center.

They instantly discovered a breakthrough within the tenth minute, because the backline recovered possession and moved it up the sector fairly seamlessly. ATK Mohun Bagan ahead Suhail Ahmad Bhat shortly capitalised upon the goal-scoring alternative by getting previous the Hammers’ backline and rounding off a medical end by placing the ball into the underside proper nook of the web.

The workforce from Kolkata was fairly tenacious of their defensive efforts thereafter, as their midfield got here collectively to interrupt assaults on the centre of the park. The trio of Suhail, Kiyan Nassiri Giri and Ningombam Engson Singh interlinked brilliantly as they exploited the open areas within the West Ham defence.

The Hammers got here throughout a superb alternative to equalise within the fiftieth minute however Lewis Orford’s spot-kick was cleverly denied by ATK Mohun Bagan shot-stopper Arshdeep, who dived low on his left to save lots of the shot. However, the substitutions that West Ham rang in did the trick for them and ensured that they averted beginning off the event with a defeat.

“The message was that we are facing a team that is the champion of the FA Youth Cup in England, which is a country in the top five of the FIFA rankings currently. They did an amazing final, beating Arsenal in the Emirates by 5-1. We knew who we were facing so the message was to keep fighting until the end, as we always do. There is always a chance, opportunity and momentum to score and we did quite well because we had three-four good chances, off which we scored one,” mentioned ATK Mohun Bagan coach Josep Maria Roma Gibert.

“The message was to have patience. We could have had more (of that). The opportunities that we created, what we planned for, what we expected, I think to be calmer around the box, to keep probing and looking for opportunities that we knew would come. Obviously, there were situations when we missed the penalty. There were opportunities in the penalty box where we should have been converting them,” West Ham United coach Lauris Coggin spoke about his pep discuss that helped his boys safe the late equaliser.

West Ham United subsequent face Bengaluru FC on May 20 whereas ATK Mohun Bagan will probably be locking horns with Stellenbosch FC of their respective subsequent video games on the identical day.