2018 SAFF Championship: Maldives wins title after 10 years
Maldives beat India 2 - 1
SAFF Suzuki Cup 2018: Maldives takes home win after a decade
Maldives has become the champioons of the 2018 SAFF Championship, after beating India 2-1.
Maldives and India went head to head in the finals on Saturday at the Bangabandhu National Stadium, also known as Dhaka Stadium in Bangladesh.
Forward Ibrahim Mahudhee Hussain took the lead by scoring the first goal of the match 19 minutes into the game. The second one was scored by Ali ‘Sentey’ Fasir during the second half, at the 66th minute.
The single goal scored by the Indian team was within the extra time, by striker Sumeet Passi.
This is Maldives' second win in the most prestigous football competition in the South Asia region. Maldives had beat India in the finals, 1 – 0, in the 2008 SAFF Championship.
Saturday's win took social media by storm, with supporters sending the team felicitations for “bringing the title home”. It is also notable that Presidential candidates incumbent President Abdulla Yameen and Ibrahim Mohamed Solih had sent congratulations to the team.
As such, Solih took to his twitter account, typing out a tweet in Dhivehi which reads that the national team of Maldives has “made the nation proud and stirred our hopes”.
Football legend Ali ‘Dhagandey’ Ashfaq had also taken to twitter, congratulating the team for their win. Ashfaq played an important role in bringing the team through to the finals in the championship of 2008.
