Mohun Bagan started the journey in this year’s Federation Cup with a goalless draw against Churchill Brothers. Both sides had a number of chances to score but none of them managed to.

 Mohun Bagan started the match with a 4-4-2 formation. Arindam was the custodian. The four defenders were – Nirmal, Eche, Khelemba and Lalrozama Fanai. The midfield consisted of  –  Denson, Masih , Jewel and Nabi. Tolgay paired skipper, Odafa up front. With both Denson and Masih operating in the centre of the midfield, Jewel had to play in the right wing. Jewel played a number of matches as a winger last season, and it is no surprise that he doesn’t enjoy playing in that position. Today was not different either, as Jewel was ineffective in the right wing, though his shot was saved by the wood-work, in the 30^th minute. Also Rakesh Masih was very slow in the midfield, allowing his counterparts Beto and Lenny to move up and create pressure on our defense. The best chance for Mohun Bagan in the first half, fell to Tolgay in the 41^st minute.  He went one-on-one with Churchill Brothers’ keeper, Sandip Nandy, but failed to score.  Odafa also got a chance to score in the 28^th minute, but his shot went over the bar.  Arindam also made two great saves (26^th and 37^th minute) in the first half.

As play resumed after the lemon break, Santosh Kashyap, replaced Masih with Manish Bhargav. This move resulted in two things – 1) Allowed Jewel to play freely in his own position at the centre of the midfield. 2) Increased the mobility in the right wing. Mohun Bagan made a brilliant start to the 2^nd half as they managed to put a lot of pressure on the Churchill defense. The Mariners earned a corner in the 48^th minute and the woodwork again came to the rescue of Churchill as Denson’s shot was denied by the post in the 50^th minute. In the 52^nd minute the Green and Maroon Brigade were denied a genuine penalty and shockingly Tolgay was booked for play-acting. In the 63^rd minute, Tolgay got injured and had to be substituted by Sabeeth. Despite Tolgay’s absence Mohun Bagan continued to attack and create chances. In the 65^th minute Fanai moved up in overlap, down the left, to find Nabi, who in turn found Odafa, whose shot was again denied by the woodwork. Beto scored in the 73^rd minute, but thankfully his goal was ruled out due to offside. Mohun Bagan earned a number of corners in the last 10 minutes, but failed to make use of them. Coach made his last change in the 87^th minute, when he replaced Nabi with Snehasish, but it did not make any change to the scoreline, which ended 0-0.

Team: Arindam, Nirmal, Eche, Khelemba, Lalrozama, Jewel, Denson, Masih(Manish Bhargav HT), Nabi(Snehasish 87’), Tolgay(Sabeeth 63’), Odafa.

Yellow Cards: Eche, Tolgay, Khelemba.

NEXT MATCH: Mohun Bagan v/s Air India [22/9/2012 at 7 p.m. (I.S.T.)]

The All India Football Federation has declared the tentative fixtures for this year’s I-League. The schedule for Mohun Bagan is as follows:

The 20-member squad for Federation Cup will be –

Goal: Arindam Bhattacharya, Shilton Paul; Defence: Nirmal Chettri, Aiborlang Khongjee, Celestine Anyichie Echezona, Khelemba Meetei, Lalrozama Fanai, Warundeep Singh; Midfield: Manish Maithani, Manish Bharghav, Rakesh Masih, Biswajit Saha, Sk. Jewel Raja, Syed Rahim Nabi, Snehasish Chakraborty, Denson Devadas; Striker: Odafa Onyeke Okolie(C), Tolgay Ozbey, Sabeeth Sathyan, Anil Kumar.

Group B – Group of death and one of the most difficult group consisting of Mohun Bagan, Churchill Brothers, Air India and Md Sporting. The matches are to be played in Siliguri. The fixture is as below:

September 20: Air India VS Mohammedan SC (3.00 PM) 
September 20: Churchill Brothers VS Mohun Bagan (7.00 PM)
September 22: Mohammedan SC VS Churchill Brothers (3.00 PM)
September 22: Mohun Bagan VS Air India (7.00 PM) 
September 24: Mohun Bagan VS Mohammedan SC (7.00 PM) 
September 24: Air India VS Churchill Brothers(3.00 PM)

Mohun Bagan and Churchill are the front runners in the group however the other two teams can create upset and change equations in the group.

Mohun Bagan:

A lot has been discussed about our team in the group. Nothing new to say. In short the success depends on three players in three positions – Eche in defence, Denson in midfield and Odafa upfront. A lot on depend on these three players. besides Nabi/Jewel/Tolgay are the three pillars in the team.

Churchill Brothers : 

A new look team under Subhash Bhowmik. A strong team on paper but not tested and seriously devoid of any match practice. But we have to remember that they started their preseason camp earliest among all Indian teams.

The fulcrum of the team remains to be midfield general Beto and the success of the team will depend on him. Besides they have a good striker in Henry from Gabon who did quite well last year. Besides they have taken two players from Lebanon – Bilal the centre back and Akram, a striker. They have two good wing halfs in Binesh Balan and Stephen Dias. They also have two very capable midfielders in Tomba SIngh and Lenny (who did well in Nehru Cup). In defence they have Ravanan and Denzil Franco. The GK position will be managed by the experienced Sandip Nandy backed by young and talented Felix. Churchill have recruited two players from Pailan who did well. They are Gurtej Singh in defense and Bikramjit SIngh in midfield which gives good balance to the team. Overall a very balanced team.

We have a tough opponent to start with, however their defense looks a bit weaker specially Bilal is yet to be tested in Indian wet conditions.

Hope we can defeat Churchill and take a major step forward towards getting back the coveted trophy.

Md Sporting :

The team under Alok Mukherjee remains to be unpredictable as last few years. One day they may have a brilliant match and the next day they look a most ordinary side. They enjoyed few good wins in the season and also had a bad matches already. The forward line looks quite compact with Sunday, Alfred and Ashim. All the strikers are among goals which is a good sign. The midfield includes veteran Jayanta Sen as the main man. Alfred is also playing a bit behind to assist the midfield. The Korean, who doesn’t look superb, but is good with his free kicks. The wings will be managed by Gourango, Mukhter, Manirul and Krishanu Banerjee. The defence mainly consists of Mohun Bagan discards in Kingshuk, Azim, Dhanrajan. They have recruited a new foreigner in that position namely Daniel. There is little or no idea regarding this player at this moment. The GK will be managed by Somnath Khara and Arnab Sen Sharma. Overall a good team and can create some upset but not my candidate to qualify for the semis.

Air India :

The Durand winners under ex Indian captain, Godfrey Perriera will also be a tough opposition to play with. Recently they have recruited three ex Mohun Baganis in Souvik Chackroborty, Micky Fernandes and Branco (Anjan da will say Sourav Chack too… but Sourav as of now is a Mohun Bagan player). The three foreigners are Tomba in defence, Junior (ex Sporting/Prayag and Salgoacar – good player but injury prone) and Henry who did moderately well in last year I League along with Manandeep. I don’t know what happened to the Japanese midfielder who looked quite good last year. John Dias, the experienced centre back has also joined Air India this year.

Anyways to keep it simple we have the team to beat all these teams and qualify for the semi final… but no easy match in hand

 (From the desk of Souvik Goswami)