I-League 2018-19: 3 reasons why East Bengal lost to Minerva Punjab

#1 Familiar mistakes occur again for East Bengal

Minerva started taking their presence felt in and around East Bengal box

Being a weekday, there was not many supporters in the stands. But those who took their time out were enthralled to see a beautiful brand of passing football from their team. East Bengal were dominating the game and on few occasion went near the goalmouth.

But the situation changed in the second half. Minerva started taking their presence felt in and around East Bengal box.

Amid constant pressure, East Bengal started crumbling. Gaps opened between Johnny Acosta and Borja Gomez Perez and Minerva started taking their opportunity from sudden counter attacks and eventually got the goal in 77th minute.

The way East Bengal conceded the goal was worst, to say the least. Young lad Makan Chothe provided a defense-splitting pass on the left hand to Moinuddin Khan. Moinuddin saw Opoku near the box and crossed for him.

East Bengal goalkeeper Ubaid CK completely failed to judge the bounce of the ball and clashed with Manoj Mohammed who too failed to intercept.

Opoku got a little touch on the ball which was enough to see the net. Neither Borja nor Acosta were present on the scene and there was a complete mess within East Bengal defence with players blaming each other.

Despite failing to leave an impression, East Bengal coach Alejandro Menendez handed Yami Longvah a start.

The move was backfired and he forced to change the right-winger early in the second half. The move to start with pint-size Brandon against tall Minerva defenders was also a questionable decision from Alejandro.

Though after the match he said, “We can still win the I-League. I am not feeling pressure. We made some mistakes and our opponents utilised that.”