Narainpur (Chhattisgarh), April 11 (IANS) Defending champions Delhi began their title defence with a massive 14-0 win against Dadra & Nagar Haveli and Daman & Diu in their opening Group F fixture of the Swami Vivekananda U-20 Men’s National Football Championship 2025 at the Ramakrishna Mission Ashrama Ground here in Narainpur on Friday.
Ten different players scored the goals for the winners. The onslaught started as early as the second minute when Moirangthem Singh opened the scoring, followed by Laishram Meitei in the 5th minute.
The stars of the game were Meitei and Aditya Adhikhari. While Metei netted two more goals in the 11th minute and 58th minute to complete his hat-trick, Aditya achieved his hat-trick in the first half itself with goals in the 22nd, 45th and the second minute of injury time.
Aman, Sankhil Tuishang, Sachin, Nishan Lopchan and Mohd Aaish were the other scorers in the second half, as Delhi completed the rout.
On the opening day, Chandigarh handed a 5-0 drubbing to Pondicherry to go top of the table in Group E while Telangana and Uttarakhand played out a goalless draw.
Chandigarh put on a dominant display, effectively finishing the contest by racing to a four-goal lead at half-time. Manveer Singh scored the tournament’s first goal – taking advantage of a loose ball to tap in from close range in the 15th minute. He added another goal, a right-footed strike into the bottom corner, in the 28th minute. Sahil scored a hat-trick with goals in the 39th, 43rd and 64th minutes – beating the goalkeeper one on one, before a couple of point-blank conversions.
Chances were few and far between in the clash between Telangana and Uttarakhand, with both sides defending well from start to finish, and ultimately hanging on for clean sheets. With only one team set to progress to the quarter-finals, there will be little margin for error in the remaining four matches of the group.
–IANS
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