India beat Kuwait to win the SAAF Championship, The match had ended 1-1 in regular time plus extra time(120 minutes), Earlier, Kuwaiti mid-filter, Shabib Al Khaldi scored the goal in the 14th minute of the game which gave the lead to his team, Lallianzuala Chhangte then scored a goal for India which S.Samad assisted in the 38th minute of the match which levelled the score to 1-1. Both the goals came in the first half of the game, the game went to extra time but no results came, the winner was then decided by a penalty shootout where India won the match by 5-4, This is India’s ninth SAFF Championship title. Defending champions India and Kuwait had also played out a 1-1 draw in their last group match.
Penalty Shootout:
From India, Sunil Chettri took the first penalty and scored followed by Sandesh, Chhangte, Udanta missed the penalty, Subhashis and Mahesh sealed the victory for India by scoring the last goal.
From Kuwait, Abdullah took the first penalty and missed it, Alotaibi, Aldhefeery, Abdulaziz, and Alkhaldi scored their penalty, Khaled took the shot but was saved by Gurpreet Singh Sandhu Indian goalkeeper by fantastic diving towards his left.
“I’m so happy everyone chipped in. They are not an easy side to play against and I’m so happy that we ended the tournament like this”. Sunil Chhetri
“All credit to the boys for not giving up after conceding the goal. I think that was the weakest point for us in the game. Kuwait just stuck to that goal and when it goes into penalties, anyone can win and today was our day.” Gurpreet Singh Sandhu