Nishu Kumar’s brace in Bengaluru FC’s 4-0 win over Abahani Dhaka here and Aizawl FC’s 2-1 upset win over New Radiant in Guwahati ensured BFC’s passage into the AFC Cup knock-out stages on Wednesday.
Prior to the final round of fixtures, BFC and New Radiant were locked on 12 points but the latter’s better head-to-head record meant that it needed to just match BFC’s result to progress. But it failed to do.
Early strikes
Two goals in a span of three minutes early on effectively killed the contest. The opener came when Chhetri rolled the ball perfectly across the face of the goal for Daniel Segovia to tap in. The skipper then went past two Abahani players to set up Nishu to double the lead.
For Nishu’s second, Chhetri chipped the ball over the Abahani defence and saw the former control the ball on his chest before firing home. Chhetri then scored his 24th goal of the season to round off a convincing win.
A draw process involving four zones — Central Asia, South Asia, East Asia and ASEAN — will determine BFC’s next opponent.
The result: BFC 4 (Segovia 13, Nishu 16, 58, Chhetri 60) bt Abahani Dhaka 0; Aizawl FC 2 ( Dodoz 61-pen, Ionescu 82) bt New Radiant 1 (Hassan 85) .
