By the time FC Goa woke up and enlivened the hitherto inert league game, the contest was in its dying stages. They made a few desperate, last-ditch efforts to take something away from Thursday night’s crucial encounter, but their sluggishness for most part of the first 60 minutes cost them the tie.

With 20 points from 14 games, a spot in the last-four (with just four matches in hand) is slipping away. But the streaky second-half goal – the only one of the match – has reinforced Chennaiyin FC’s chances of qualifying for the knockouts for the third time in Indian Super League.

Insipid first half

Dhanpal Ganesh’s yellow card in the 10th minute of the match is the only key event listed in the first half on the ISL website’s Match Centre. This apart, there wasn’t a lot happening in the humdrum half of the game that promised to be a thriller, considering both teams needed a win to strengthen their semi-final chances.

But the slip-ups, which started from the third touch of the ball – when Narayan Das, despite unchallenged, pushed the ball outside – pockmarked the rest of the first half. The Super Machans made the first few advances to goal. A better leap by Dhanpal whilst attempting a header off a corner in the 19th minute would have put Chennaiyin in the lead but the Goan defenders scrambled to clear the ball.

The hosts allowed the Chennai team another chance in the 36th minute. Their defenders – three of them – covered an incoming Inigo Calderon in three sides, leaving a gap on the right, where Bikramjit Singh parallely ran to receive his teammate’s pass.

Mohamed Ali desperately dove to stop Bikram’s delayed shot and the Goan goalie Naveen Kumar pushed it – but not away from danger. Jeje rushed in to shoot Chennaiyin’s first goal but the Goan goalie had made a swift recovery to block it. His coach John Gregory fumed at the missed opportunity, while the Goan coach Sergio Lobera sighed with relief.

Chennaiyin’s stroke of luck

There were a lot of passes in the middle as the Chennai team decided to hang back, waiting to counter-attack or a set-piece. Incision, coach Gregory said after the match, wasn’t the visitors’ strategy.

“Basically, we were quite happy to sit back in our half for the majority of the game and hope that we just get something on a counter-attack maybe or from a set-piece,” he said. “Because if we try to match Goa man for man, they play football possibly better than us.”

But in the few chaotic seconds in the 51st minute that culminated in the game’s only goal, Goa’s football was shabby. First, Narayan Das from the backline (just outside the right side of the D-box) failed to clear the ball well.

Francisco Fernandes intercepted and passed it to Inigo Calderon, who deflected towards Gregory Nelson. Nelson, from just outside the goal box, unleashed a left-footed stroke that Naveen dove in the air to block. Jeje collected the deflection from the side of the net to put it past the keeper. But the two Goan defenders scrambling to parry the ball away failed to keep away Calderon, who tapped it in.

Only a few minutes ago, Jeje had made a similar attempt that went past the goalie and towards the goal but Narayan Das, then, held his nerves and cleared it away for a corner. But the security of the Goan defence, in the early minutes of the second half, wasn’t water-tight. And, football, on Thursday night at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium, was not quite the beautiful game.

Goa’s delayed resurgence

Gregory conceded after the game that his boys’ primary objective was to keep a clean sheet. Goa, he said, are possibly one of the best football teams in the ISL. This assessment would have been off the mark if one saw just the first 60 minutes of Goa’s game.

For, after that, the home team, triggered perhaps by its survival instinct, was more intent on attacking. And, within a space of 10 minutes, they created two chances: one Edu Bedia curler from outside the box that deflected off the bar and a Hugo Boumous right-footed kick that the Chennai defence cleared away. The home team came close to equalising in the 70th minute but goalkeeper Karanjit Singh and his defenders worked in cohesion to thwart the danger.

Neither team dominated but Chennai worked better to get away with a clean sheet. The strategy, ultimately, worked well for the team. And, the coach lauded his boys for making it work.

“I’ll put nothing past my group of players,” Gregory said. “They are a fantastic bunch. They work exceptionally hard for one another as we saw tonight. There is a tremendous team spirit amongst them. Everybody plays a part. And the boys that came off the bench did a good job for us well.”