Flavio Rodrigues's header in the 57th minute enabled Mumbai's Mahindra United beat Salgaocar, Goa, 1-0 in a ninth National Football League match at the Cooperage in Mumbai on Thursday.
In a match which witnessed below par performances from both the teams, the Mumbai champions, who were reduced to ten men after their medio Arun Malhotra was given marching orders for punching Salgaocar winger Felix Ibrebru in the face in the 62nd minute, held on to their one-goal cushion with some dogged defensive tactics to emerge triumphant.
Rodrigues headed home following a free-kick by S Venkatesh.
Soon after Salgaocar's Ibrebru's try off winger Bernard Pires's forward pass was well-saved by Nandy. Then came two fine saves by the Salgaocar defence in quick succession. First, Flavio's
try was well saved by Salgaocar goalkeer Juje Siddi; then substitute Abhishek Yadav's header was saved on the goalline by Salgaocar's substitute Bhuvan Joshi.
Mahindra could have increased their scoreline but Yadav shot over a fine cross from Rodrigues with just ten minutes to go for the final hooter.
Salgaocar too got a gilt-edged chance to equalise in the 85th minute when substitute Ragui Singh's floater beat Nandy in the air before Yadav effected a goalline save.
Salgaocar made three substitutios, bringing in Ragui Singh for medio Amandeep Singh in the 30th minute, Bhuvan Joshi for Bernard Pires in the 65th minute and Samson Singh for defender Pawan Kumar in the 70th minute.
Mahindra made two changes, bringing in Steven Dias for medio Khalid Jamil in the 35th minute and Yadav for defender N S Manju in the 55th minute.
There were also three yellow card shown -- one to Mahindra defender L Surkumar Singh and two to Salgaocar defenders Pawan Kumar and Roberto Fernandes for rough tackles, apart from a red card to Malhotra.
Mahindra defender Covan Lawrence was declared the man-of-the-match for his fine showing.
Mahindra United will take on Kolkata's Tollygunge Agragami in their next match at the Cooperage on February 11.
