Indian Super League 2022-23: Kerala Blasters vs SC East Bengal – Match 1 Summary

Kerala Blasters and SC East Bengal opened the ninth season of the Indian Super League at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in Kochi. The game also saw the return of the fans inside the stadium after the 2019-20 season. For the last couple of seasons, COVID-19 and its variants compelled die-hard Indian Football Fans to watch the game at home.

Now, with the fans returning to the stadium, they were treated to an entertaining game. In the first half of the game, players from both teams tried to score but failed due to tight defenses. However, the first 45 minutes were also marred by a lot of fouls from both teams. Also, there were a considerable number of off-sides and missed chances from both sides.

Kerala Blaster’s late goals won them the game

The game was poised 0-0 at the start of the second half. Both teams repeated the pattern of the first half (unintentionally though). In the phase from 60th to 63 rd minute, two players of East Bengal – Chungnunga Lal and Ankit Mukherjee were shown yellow cards. The duo was guilty of bad fouls.

In the 72nd minute of the game, the home team (Kerala) got an opening thanks to Adrian Luna. He was assisted by Harmanjot Khabra and left-footed the shot to score for the Yellow Brigade. Three minutes, the visitors might have leveled the scores if not for the save from the goalkeeper. After this, two players each from both teams fouled, and one another from the Blasters was shown a Yellow card.

In the 80th minute, both teams got involved in substitution in an aggressive manner. The Bengal team replaced three players while Kerala replace two. The tactic certainly worked for the Blasters as Ivan Kalyuzhnyi, who replaced Apostolos Giannou, scored in the 82nd minute. In the 88th minute, the White brigade scored their first goal thanks to Alex. This made it look like the game might end in a draw if the Bengal scores another one. However, Ivan’s second goal of the game in the last minute of the game sealed the game. Kerala won by 3-1.