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Dhaka: The Indian football team lost 1-2 to much-lower ranked Maldives in the final of the SAFF Cup at the Bangabandhu National Stadium here on Saturday.
Maldives scored in either half, and the only Indian goal came in the added extra time of the second half courtesy a Sumeet Passi strike.
India, coached by Stephen Constantine, started on a positive note but a couple of counter attacks and a resilient defensive display from Maldives shattered the defending champions' dream of clinching their record eighth SAFF title.
India were the brighter side at the start of the match as they continued to push Maldives to their limit until they scored against the run of the play in the 19th minute.
On a quick counter-attacking move, Naiz Hussain played a deft delivery to Ibrahim Hussain only to see him gleefully score the opener before the 20-minute mark.
Meanwhile, this was the first instance in the SAFF Suzuki Cup 2018 where India were trailing against their opponents.
India, in their pursuit of the equaliser, came close quite a few times but the attackers were missing the finesse in front of the opposition goal.
On the half-hour mark, Ashique delivered a low cross from the left flank directed to Farukh who lost his balance to lose the opportunity.
On the resultant corner, Subhasish jumped to head it home but the Maldivian goalie Mohamed Faisal fisted the danger away.
One minute later, Manvir Singh, who happened to be the reigning highest scorer of SAFF Suzuki Cup 2018, latched on another attack but it rippled the side-netting. India headed to the changing room trailing by the solitary goal.
Maldives doubled their lead in the 68th minute to add a pinch of salt to India's wounds. On another quick counter-attacking move, Hamzath Mohamed outran the Indian defence line to glide it on to an onrushing Ali Fasir who poked it home to send the Maldives bench into raptures.
Subhasish got another tantalisingly appealing chance to breach the Maldivian defence from a well-taken corner by Hitesh in the 79th minute.
He was left completely unmarked and a tap-in could have done the trick for the boys in Blue but the skipper mistimed it to see the ball go out of bounce.
