Joaquim Abranches and Suraj Hadkonkar shine in Dempo's big win

Jessel Carneiro played an important role in Golden Eagles big win.

Joaquim Abranches and Suraj Hadkonkar scored the braces as Dempo Sports Club registered a massive 6-1 win over Velsao Sports and Cultural Club in the Goa Professional League match played at Duler Stadium earlier today.

Dempo who had defeated defending champions Sporting Clube de Goa were high on confidence and their coach Samir Naik chose to go with the same lineup which earned him full points in the last match. On the other hand, Velsao coach Eban Mesquita made three changes to his side as goalkeeper Suresh Lamani was back in the lineup, while he also gave the start to Charles Miranda and U-20 forward Dylan Rodrigues.

Dempo started the match in a style and came twice close to scoring but could not capitalise the chances. In one of these, Beevan D’Mello brilliantly cut past two defenders after getting a through pass from Desmon Pereira but shot wide from close with just keeper Lamani at the stake.

However, the Golden Eagles managed to surge ahead through Pruthvesh Pedenekar as the U-20 winger brilliantly headed in from close, off Jessel Carneiro’s curling cross to make it 1-0 for his side in the 26th minute.

It was just three minutes from the opening goal when Joaquim Abranches who had scored the brace in the last match, recorded his name on the scoresheet as this time Beevan’s cross was smartly headed in the back of the nets making it 2-0 for the Golden Eagles.

The rest of the session witnessed a dominant play from the Panjim based club where they came with few more chances only to see it failing in the final third.  

On crossing over, Dempo completely dominated the session with continues attacks inflated their lead in the 74th minutes when Velti Cruz easily cut past a defender and calmly finished the ball in the back of the net to make it 3-0.

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Velsao pulled one back from the counter-attack as their skipper Joseph Pereira brilliantly finished the ball in the net making it 3-1 for the South Goan club.

Dempo coach Naik brought in Suraj Hadkonkar to replace Pruthvesh and the winger scripted his name on the score sheet within a few minutes after coming in as after getting a hold on a perfect through pass from Beevan, he made no mistake to beat the Velsao keeper Lamani for Dempo’s fourth goal.

Energized by the goals, Dempo added two more goals in the last five minutes as first, Abranches completed his brace when he once again smartly headed in from the close to Suraj’s curling cross, whereas, Suraj also scored his second and team’s sixth goal in the added time when he was fed with a fine cross by Jessel, where his strike from inside the box entered the bottom corner.