Abahani ride on red hot Sunday

Nigerian striker Sunday Chizoba struck twice to bring league leaders Abahani back to winning ways in the JB Bangladesh Premier League with a 2-0 win over Arambagh KS at MA Aziz Stadium in Chittagong yesterday.

The brace not only helped the league's top scorer to take his tally to 18, four clear of Brothers Union's Nkowcha Kingsley, but also put the four-time champions in pole position with 39 points from 17 outings, five ahead of second-placed Chittagong Abahani.

The defeat, meanwhile, left Arambagh at seventh position of the 12-team table with 21 points.

From the outset, Abahani looked as shaky as they were in their goalless draw against Brothers Union, but one thing they did right was to keep possession of the ball throughout the game, which ultimately helped them post their 11th win.

Coach George Kottan preferred to start with three foreign forwards – Sunday, Lee Tuck and Jonathan David – like the previous two matches, but the trio could hardly trouble Arambagh defence at the initial stages.

It was rather Arambagh who came close to taking the lead somewhat against the run of play when Abu Sufian Sufil saw his back-header on a flick from Mohammad Abdullah drift wide of the far post on 16 minutes before Sunday broke the deadlock at the other end three minutes later. 

Tapu Barman played on Hemanta Vincent Biswas on the left flank and the midfielder raced into the box to cut the ball back to Sunday, who drove a diagonal shot along the ground to beat Arambagh goalkeeper Mitul Hasan.

Having capitalised on a forward-pass from Emon Babu, Sunday then wasted a great opportunity by sending the ball wide of the target in the 37th minute, but he made amends by doubling the lead in the 71st minute. Lee Tuck played on Sunday outside the box and the Nigerian hitman shrugged off his marker Issa Yusuf to strike his 18th goal of the campaign.

Sunday went close to slotting his second hattrick in the stoppage time of the match when substitute Jewel Rana put a low cross from the right flank which the Nigerian back-heeled, only to see it miss the far post by few inches.

Meanwhile, Mohammedan SC notched up their third victory of the campaign with a 2-0 win over Brothers Union as the Chittagong leg came to an end. Ismail Bangoura and Aminur Rahman Sajib struck one goal apiece to help the Black and Whites raise their tally to 17 points. Brothers remained on 22 points.