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CUTTACK: ‘Mission hat-trick’ for West Bengal suffered a jolt in their first match of the 66th National Football Championship at the Barabati Stadium on Friday (May 18) when the defending champions went down 1-2 to Maharashtra in a Group A quarter-final league clash.
Bengal had won the last two editions of the tournament in Kolkata and Guwahati.
Kailash Patil scored the first goal for Maharashtra in the 20th minute – a lead which Maharashtra maintained till the interval.
Changing over, Bengal went all out for the equaliser but were not successful. On the contrary, Linekar Machado doubled the score for Maharashtra in the 70th minute.
However, Bengal captain Tarif Ahmed pulled one back in the 71st minute but Maharashtra managed to hold fort for the last 19 minutes.
In other score:
Manipur beat Meghalaya 1-0.
Kerala beat Punjab 2-1
Goa blanked Uttar Pradesh 2-0
