The Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium saw unprecedentedscenes as India overcame African giants Cameroon 5-4 in a penalty shootout hereSunday to lift the Nehru Cup for the third consecutive time.
Football fans invaded the pitch as Makon Thierry missed hisspot-kick to give India a hat-trick of Nehru Cup titles.
The Indian players were completely surrounded by a massivecrowd as police had to be called to disperse them.
"Oh my god! We just beat Cameroon," shouted anelated fan.
India held the Central Africans to a 2-2 draw in normal timeas Sunil Chhetri and Gouramangi Singh found the back of the net.
Neither team could find the winner in extra-time as thematch headed to penalties.
Fans, who had chosen to give the Nehru Cup footballtournament a miss, came in large numbers to witness history being scripted.
With the rain gods being kind, over 12,000 came to witnessthe final.
"I had to come see the final, India is playing. But itwould have been even better if the actual Cameroon international side had come.If Samuel Eto'o, Alex Song and Benoit Assou-Ekotto were here that would havebeen great," Siddharth Arora, a student, told IANS.
It was the most vociferous support India has got in thetournament.
Flag waving, trumpet blowing and drum beating echoedthroughout the ground with every touch of the ball by an Indian player cheeredloudly.
There was more good news for the Indian team as president ofthe All India Football Federation (AIFF) Praful Patel doubled the winning prizemoney from $100,000 to $200,000.
