India thrash Puerto Rico 4-1 in international football friendly

Mumbai: The Indian national football team came up with a dominating performance to thrash Puerto Rico 4-1 in an international friendly match at the Andheri Sports Complex here on Saturday.

Narayan Das (18th minute), Sunil Chhetri (26), Jeje Lalpekhlua (34) and Jackichand Singh (58) helped the hosts earn a much deserving win. Emmanuel Sanchez scored the only goal for the visitors.

India played with 4-2-3-1 formation with striker Jeje Lalpekhlua leading the attack with Jackichand Singh, and Chhetri helping him.

The Puerto Ricans started the match on a positive note scoring the opening goal in the eighth minute to give the visitors the advantage right at the start.

But the home side did not sit back but struck right after a few minutes via Narayan to level the scoring.

The first goal gave the Stephen Constantine-coached side much-needed confidence as they stormed ahead with the second goal via former skipper Chettri.

Soon after his strike, the home fans erupted with joy as Jeje netted home the third goal of the night for India to put the home side right in control.

The first half thriller stayed at 3-1 as India held the advantage.

Coming into the second half, India played much positively and went on to earn the fourth goal via star player Jackichand.

From there on there was no looking back for India as they surged ahead with quality defence and went on to win the match comfortably.