MORANG, April 1: Morang XI has advanced into the quarterfinals of the ongoing fifth Birat Gold Cup Football Tournament by beating Bhutan’s Thimpu Football Club 2-0 in the curtain raiser on Saturday. 

Despite dominating the possession throughout the match, Morang failed to add more to its tally and Thimpu could not score as it failed to convert its chances in the match. 

At the Shahid Stadium, the game ended in a goalless first half, but Morang snatched its chances in the second period to win the match. Both the teams played attacking football in the second half, but the success was on the side of Morang as Bhuwan Basnet scored the first goal in the hour mark to put Morang in cruise control as he converted a rebound to score. 

After conceding the first goal, Thimpu created some wonderful chances, but failed to convert any of them. Morang’s Nishan Limbu scored in a counter attack in the injury time of the second half utilizing a pass from Nigerian player Pius. 

Morang head coach Paras Chaudhary expressed his satisfaction with the performance of his side, but said he was not happy with the result. 

“We put a very good performance in our home stadium today, but with regards to the performance, the result was not good enough,’’ Chaudhary said. “We should have scored more goals, but we had to satisfy for the narrow lead as we could not convert the chances we got in front of the goal.’’ 

“Starting the tournament with a win is an important thing and we will field our team next time to improve further in the other matches,’’ he added.

Thimpu head coach Changchuk Dorji said that the result was not in their side despite performing well. 

“The players played as expected, but it is a bad luck that we could not get the result to our side with the type of performance we put in,’’ Dorji said. 

Limbu of the winning team was named the man-of-the-match and was rewarded with Rs 10,000. 

Sankata Football Club will take on India’s Mohammedan Sporting Club on Sunday. 

A total of 10 teams are taking part in the tournament from Nepal, India and Bhutan. The final will be played on April 9.  

The winner will take home Rs 1.271 million, while the runner-up will be rewarded with Rs 551,000. Likewise, the best goalkeeper, the best defender, the best midfielder, the best forward and the best coach will be prized with Rs 25,000 each. The best player of the tournament will get a motorcycle.

 
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