Proving critics wrong, Lone Star Kashmir FC has cruised into the final round of the Second Division I-League after holding ARA FC to 1-1 draw at SMVD sports complex, Katra , Jammu on Saturday, April 6.
Playing its last match of the group phase in Jammu, Lone Star needed a draw to qualify for the final round of the league. Their opponents, ARA FC on the other hand were in need of an outright win to make it to next round. The match ended in 1-1 draw and with that Lone Star qualified for the final round of the league and are in now contention to qualify for the I-League.
Despite being reduced to 10-men for most of the match, Lone Star held on to claim a hard fought draw to earn a point that paved their way into the next round.
Lone Star got to an excellent start to the match with Hamza giving them lead in 26th minute. Only minutes later in the 29th minute of game, referee awarded Adeyemi of Lone Star red card. It reduced Lone Star to 10-men and ARA FC took full advantage of that quickly. They were able to score equalizer in the 33rd minute through Parminder Singh. It looked like that Kashmir FC will fail on to hold on and ARA FC may go on to win match. They kept attacking Lone Star from every angle but the hosts held on. At half time score was 1-1.
In the second half, Lone Star made one change early, strengthen its defense in the absence of one player. The move helped them to thwart the moves made by ARA FC. The visitors tried everything to score that important goal, even went on to make three back to back changes but goal eluded them. At the end of the allotted time score was 1-1 and Lone Star qualified for the final round.
Lone Star finished group phase with 11 points while as ARA FC finished with 10 points. By virtue of one point advantage Lone Star made it to final round that I likely top start after April 21.
Lone Star Kashmir FC’s mentor and former international footballer Ishfaq Ahmad termed the qualification of Kashmir FC into final round as great news for the football fans of the state.
“No one had given this team a chance of qualifying into next round,. Everyone here in J&K State who call themselves football pundits had outrightly rejected any chance of this team making it to next round. Today this team has proven all of them wrong. It has again cemented the age old fact that there is no substitute to hard work,” said Ishfaq Ahmad.
“I am happy for their qualification as this team played like a team. There was no individual brilliance but total team effort involved. We had no big names in our team and it looked hard to make it through. But the belief of players and support staff made it possible,” he said.
He said that there is big plus from the qualification of Lone Star Kashmir FC as most of the players belonged to J&K State.
“Majority of the players in this team are from J&K and they have been playing well. This is big news for the football of our State and it will help in the overall development of our J&K football,” he said.