KOCHI: Chennaiyin FC and Kerala Blasters played out a 1-1 draw in the ISL at the GMC Bambolim Stadium on Sunday which typified how their season has panned out.
While the Super Machan's inability to be clinical in front of the goal was laid bare, Blasters' fragile defence was only spared by the lacklusterness of the Chennaiyin attackers.
Fatkhullo Fatkhuloev (10) gave Chennaiyin the lead but Gary Hooper equalised in the 29th minute. Chennaiyin finish their campaign with a lowly 20 points while Blasters have a game left against NorthEast United.
In what could be a sign of things to come for Chennaiyin, the captain's armband was handed over to Anirudh Thapa with the India international captaining the side for the first time.
The Marina Machans could have scored a handful of goals in the first five minutes as the Blasters defence looked all over the place. The centre-back pairing of Bakary Kone and Costa Nhamoinesu who looked listless in the last game looked shaky here as well, as the Kerala backline was not able to cope with the pace of Chennaiyin's wingers. Lallianzuala Chhangte in particular was a live-wire down the left flank and kept on putting in dangerous balls into the box.
Skipper Thapa came close on two occasions while striker Jakub Sylvester also had a header sail over the bar. Enes Sipovic then saw his header hit the crossbar as Chennaiyin were putting Blasters under tremendous pressure. It was wave after wave of attacks and they finally managed to break the deadlock in the tenth minute.
Fatkhulo was picked out down the right side of the Blasters penalty box by Edwin Vanspaul. The Tajikistani international managed to cut inside and slammed the ball past Albino Gomes with his left foot. After that initial wave of pressure the tempo dropped and Blasters started to grow into the game. They managed to get back into the game after the referee awarded a penalty with Deepak Tangri being adjudged to have handled the ball inside the box. Hooper stepped up and scored what was the 200th goal of his career.
Blasters managed to finish the half strongly after withstanding the early pressure as both teams went into the break level at 1-1.
If Chennaiyin were more clinical, they could have scored two or three more goals. The second half was a cagey affair that saw a string of bookings with the likes of Deepak Tangri and Thoi Singh picking up yellow cards in the first ten minutes of the second half.
Neither side managed to hold onto possession and kept giving it away as there was no attacking build up or notable goalmouth action as the game just fizzled out.
There was one long range effort from Blasters skipper Jessel Carneiro whose effort was tipped away by Vishal Kaith in the dying minutes as the two teams split the points.