Prayag United won the 117th IFA Shield riding on Ranti Martins' shoulder.

         Prayag United has won the 117^th edition of IFA Shield beating, another Kolkata giant East Bengal in the final of the tournament by a solitary goal margin at Salt Lake stadium yesterday evening. Ranti Martins scored the decider in the 78^th minute of the game. Ranti Martins is nominated the “man of the match” for his excellent performance.

        This is the maiden IFA Shield victory for Prayag United in the history of IFA Shield on the other hand East Bengal kept their tradition intact of losing in the final by beating arch-rival Mohun Bagan in the semifinal & after 1971 anytime apart from Mohun Bagan & East Bengal from Kolkata became the victorious.

       These same two sides met in the last year’s IFA Shield final where East Bengal became the victorious by beating Prayag by tie-breaker shoot-out. Eventually these two sides met in the group league encounter of this tournament even where East Bengal easily managed to win against the same opponents by 2-0 margin.

        Due to the injury of Chhidi, Trevor James Morgan started with Andrew Borisich from the beginning. In the other hand Prayag also had few injury problems, missed two of their key players CK Vineeth & Dhancahandra Singh.

         Battle became equivalent in the first half, though both the sides had their chances failed to convert opportunities. Neither side could found the net in first half, match ended in a goalless stalemate.

         We got a different Prayag United side after restart of the game while East Bengal started to lost their control from the match.

         Carlos Hernandez was brilliant during the entire second half, tested several times East Bengal custodian Gurpree Singh Sandhu from long rangers. It was only Gurpreet who saved the agony for red & gold brigade or else the purple brigade could have scored few more.

           However the decider came in the 78^th minute of the game while substituted Malswama Tluanga delivered a long ball to Ranti Martins from midfield & Ranti didn’t make any mess to guide past the ball upcoming Gurpreet to net.

        In later Morgan had brought injured Chiddi & Bhasum, they also created a good chance but only due to Belo Rasaq & Dipak Mondal in Prayag defence they failed to do anything more.

        Belo Rasaq & Dipak Mondal remained instrumental in the Prayag Defence throughout the match alongwith Carlos Hernandez in their midfield.

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