ISL 2018-19: Chennaiyin FC 0-0 Delhi Dynamos FC - Hits and Flops of the match
Delhi Dynamos and Chennai City FC played out an uninspiring draw at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in Delhi to share a point each.
Chennai, for the second successive game in a row, decided to start without the Indian forward Jeje Lalpekhlua, but to no successive result. They did lack the quality in the final third to put the ball in the back of the net much like what Delhi is experiencing now. Chennai dominated the home side in the midfield play and created far more opportunities to score. But Carlos Salom could not capitalize much on the day. The same was the story at the other end of the pitch, where Lallianzuala Chhangte did put in some terrific runs down the lane and crossed some inch-perfect passes only for Andrija Kaludjerovic to waste them.
Both the teams had equal possession in the game while the passing accuracy was slightly in favour of the Chennaiyin FC at a decent 71% compared to Delhi’s 70%. But the equality in possession and passes did not amount much to the shots in the final third for Delhi. While Delhi had only 2 shots on target in the game, Chennai had 7. Even in the case of the number of crosses into the penalty box, Chennai had 20 while Delhi was only able to make 13 crosses on the day. With the stats clearly speaking about the lack of a cutting edge striker for Chennaiyin FC, John Gregory will be a worried man right now.
Here are the primary hits and flops from the game.
#5 Hit Raphael Augusto
The kingpin of the Chennaiyin FC midfield was playing alongside Anirudh Thapa today while the Spaniard Orlandi took the forward Midfield slot. Raphael Augusto was at his usual best teasing opponents with his crafty skills on the pitch forcing opponents to make fouls and win free kicks for his team.
He came up against the ex-Chennaiyin FC player, Rene Mihelic, on many occasions and came out with flying colours. The fact that Rene Mihelic could not do much justifies why Raphael was opted by John Gregory last year ahead of Mihelic as the go-to guy for Chennaiyin FC.
Raphael Augusto ended up winning the Limitless player award and it is quite a justified one at that.