Tolly in semis

BANGALORE: Kalyan Chaubey seemed set to make what should have been a regulation collection. The Fransa goalkeeper allowed the ball to slip from his grasp and opened the floodgates as it were. An entire session of domination and hard work came to nought for Fransa as they crashed to a 0-3 defeat to Tollygunge Agragami in the 26th Federation Cup football championship on Sunday.The Kolkata team crucified Fransa on a cross of shoddy defending, en route to booking their berth in the semifinals.
In the end, Tollygunge made it look easy. But the final scoreline belies Fransa''s almost total domination in the first session. Unfortunately for Fransa, they were never able to translate that domination into a goal, their finish hardly matching their dazzling midfield play. Tollygunge, in their characteristic style, were happy to put attack on the back burner and settled down to keeping Fransa at bay.
That task they accomplished to a nicety as Fransa, despite holding possession for long spells, hardly got a good look at the goal. Their best came 10 minutes from close when Noushad Pari trapped a lob from Saikhom Singh and let fly a right footer, a shot which failed to trouble Arindam Ghosh.
That failed attempt was a summation of Fransa''s show in the first session. Sebastiao Endro never came close to matching his earlier shows.