India, Bangladesh joint winners of SAFF Women’s U-19 C’ships

Dhaka: India and hosts Bangladesh were proclaimed equal winners of the SAFF Women's Under-19 Football Championships on Thursday, despite the fact that the visitors initially thought they had won the title through a coin flip, in an unusual change of decision by match officials.

The match ended 1-1 after 90 minutes of regulation play, and the referee ordered a direct penalty shootout.

Interestingly, all the 11 players from both sides, including the goalkeepers, converted their penalty kicks.

After the scoreline reached 11-11, the referee was about to continue the penalty shootout when she was told not to do that.

Suddenly, she called in the captains of the two sides and the toss of the coin was done. India was the lucky side to win the toss of the coin and they celebrated.

The Bangladeshis protested and their players refused to leave the field of play for a long time.

There was confusion and pandamonium all along and the sizeable crowd were seen throwing a few bottles onto the field and shouting slogans.

After more than one hour, the match commissioner, who initially took the decision to toss the coin, changed his decision and India and Bangladesh were declared joint winners.

“It was a good gesture from the All India Football Federation. We accepted the decision to declare both sides as joint winners,” an AIFF source said.

There was confusion on the part of the match officials regarding the tournament rules, which led to the unprecedented scenes.

With PTI inputs