Nepali international Santosh Sahukhala scored a hat-trick including a last gasp winner for Three Star Club in its 3-2 win over 10-man Yeti Airlines Himalayan Sherpa Club and McDowell´s Ranipokhari Corner Team (RCT) maintained its unbeaten run with a 1-0 win over Samsung Jawalakhel Youth Club despite playing with 10 men for much of the match. [break]
The second match saw the sending off of Sherpa forward Hope Ralley in the 76th minute after he was shown the second yellow card of the match for entering the field without the referee´s permission following medical treatment.
Santosh Shahukhala of Three Star celebrates hattrick. (Photo: Bikash Karki)
Sherpa´s coach Meghraj KC however, questioned the fairness of referees. "Are rules different for member of national team," questioned KC referring to similar incident during Three Star´s match against Friends involving a national player. "I am not blaming the referee for sending off my player but it is the question of treatment. ANFA and the referee should be answerable and if the decision was wrong, they should apologize publicly."
Himalayan Sherpa took a surprise lead through Ganesh Khadka´s brilliant half-volley in the 37th minute which left Nepali national goalkeeper Kiran Chemjong with no chance.
Nepali national striker Santosh Sahukhala cancelled the lead during the injury time of first half when he back-heeled Joshua´s cross from the area. Sahukhala made it 2-1 five minutes into the second half.
But the lead was short lived and an own goal by Three Star defender gifted the equalizer in the 56th minute.
Sahukhala was also denied by custodian Chaudhary in one-on-one situation in the 51st minute while Sahukhala, Anil Ojha and Joshua all failed to connect Bijay Gurung´s cross ahead of goal line in the 84th minute. Sahukhala completed his hat-trick just seconds before the final whistle to give his team a hard fought win.
"We were lucky today but it is all due to the hard work of players," Three Star coach Pradip Humagain said. "We changed the formation from 4-4-2 to 3-4-3 during the later stages of the match. We had good communication and the strategy worked."
In the day´s kick off match, RCT´s Noor Raj Kafle was sent off by referee Sudish Pandey in the 42nd minute after second yellow card. RCT opened the score in the 53rd minute through Amar Dangol which was enough to earn them the victory.
"Both the cards were unnecessary," RCT coach Madhu Karki said during the post match conference. "On both occasions there were minimum contacts," said Karki.
Karki termed the victory as fortunate. "It was not a good performance and we can´t beat big teams with such performance," said Karki.
Both RCT and Jawalakhel saw couple of their chances wasted or saved early in the match. RCT´s Ntolo Ngoumou and Jawalakhe´s John Dike hit the woodwork
Jawalakhel coach Kishor KC said it was a bad day for the team. "The striker never showed killer instinct."
With its fourth win, RCT moved one spot up to join leaders Machhindra at the top of table with 13 points. But RCT lies in the second spot on the basis of goal difference. Three Star is in third position with 12 points. Sherpa lies on the 13th place with four points and Jawalakhel is in the tenth with six points.
Ganesh Khadka scores 100th league goal
Winger Ganesh Khadka´s first goal for Himalayan Sherpa in its 3-2 defeat against Three Star was the 100th goal of the current league season. Coincidentally, the goal was also the first in the league for Khadka. With the completion of 40 matches, 104 goals have been scored with an average of 2.6 goals per match. Among them nine were from penalty and five own goals. 44 goals were scored in first half and 60 in the second half.
Wednesday´s matches
APF Vs Bansbari @ 12:30 NST
Police Vs Bauddha @ 14:30 NST
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