On a high: Altyn Asyr FC players celebrate a goal during their AFC Champions League 2 match against East Bengal FC at the VYBK Stadium, in Kolkata, Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2024.
| Photo Credit: PTI
Turkmenistan side Altyn Asyr FC recovered from a goal deficit to beat home favourite East Bengal FC 3-2 in the Preliminary 1 tie of the AFC Champions League Two (ACL Two) at the Salt Lake Stadium here on Wednesday.
East Bengal started with promise and found its initiative paying off in the seventh minute when David Hmar found the Asyr net. East Bengal showed the intent and the effort to invade the opposition box at regular intervals and found the break as Nandhakumar Sekar chugged up the left channel to set up David, who dived low to connect with a fine header.
The Altyn-Asyr goalkeeper Batyr Babayev blocked the effort just to see the ball rebound back to the East Bengal forward, who made no mistake with his tap in.
Stung by the early reverse, the Turkmenistan side opted for a high-press approach and found the equaliser in the 17th minute. Myrat Annayev beat an attempted off-side trap by the home side and neatly placed the ball into the left corner of the net. The host conceded further as Altyn-Asyr made it 2-1 in the 27th minute off a fine free-kick conversion from Selim Nurmyradov.
The visitor continued to impress with its combination play after the interval, which helped it breach the East Bengal defence once again early in the second half.
Myrat Annayev did the hard work as he sped up the right to fire an angular shot that was tapped home by Mihail Titov to create a two-goal cushion for Altyn-Asyr in the 52nd minute.
Spanish midfielder Saul Crespo showed some fine skills to dribble past a couple of Asyr defenders and finally curled it past the opponent goalkeeper to make it 2-3 for East Bengal.
The host put up a great fight hereafter and almost got the equaliser in the 80th minute just to see the goal by its Brazilian forward Cleiton Silva disallowed by the referee for an infringement. The loss meant East Bengal will now be playing in the AFC Challenge Cup later in the year.
The result: East Bengal FC 2 (David Hmar 7, Saul Crespo 59) lost to Altyn Asyr FC 3 (Myrat Annayev 17, Selim Nurmyradov 27, Mihail Titov 52).