Margao: Xavier Vijay Kumar's second half brace guided Bangalore HAL to a convincing 4-2 victory over Dempo Sports Club to save themselves from relegation in the final match of the I-League at Nehru Stadium.
Xavier Vijay Kumar scored in the 51st and 68th minutes while R C Prakash and J Murali found the Dempo net in the 10th and 88th minutes.
For Dempo, the last edition winners, Ranty Martins scored twice -- in the 25th and 41st minutes -- to take his tally of goals to 30 and win the Golden Boot award.
With today's win, HAL took their tally to 24 points from 26 matches, the same as Air India, ONGC and JCT. With the head-to-head results counting when teams are tied on equal points, Air India and HAL ended at 11th and 12th respectively in the 14-team league and thus saved from relegation.
ONGC and JCT, who have the lowest head to head points among the four bottom placed teams, were relegated.
Dempo, on the other hand, finished third with 50 points behind East Bengal, who have 51 points, after beating Chirag United 2-1 in their last match in Kolkata.
Goa's Salgaocar Sports Club have already won the title having amassed 56 points from their 26 games.
The visitors, who needed a win to save themselves from relegation, showed a lot of urgency in their attack and moved the ball mostly from the flanks and kept the rival defence guessing with lofted passes before taking the lead in the 10th minute.
Xavier, from the right, floated the ball into the box where R C Prakash met with a diving header to beat goalkeeper Laxmikant Kattimani to his right.
The early goal helped HAL to attack with more vigour and the visitors came close to increasing their lead twice but Dempo goalkeeper Laxmikant made good saves to deny Jagaba Hamza Amaba and J Murali from scoring.
Dempo played a waiting game with HAL doing most of the attacking and came with snap raids and found the equaliser in the 25th minute.
Following a foul on Clifford Miranda by defender R Srikant, Debrata Roy, who took the free kick, floated the ball into the box for Ranty Martins to head in.
HAL then came with a counter move few minutes later when a cross by Xavier was volleyed in by R C Prakash but keeper Laxmikant did well to put the ball out.
After the close shave, Ranty Martins put Dempo in the lead in the 41st minute when he beat a rival defender on top of the box and essayed an angular left-footer to find the far corner of the net to have Dempo leading 2-1 at half time.
HAL came hard on Dempo in the second half and Xavier, who was the pick of the HAL players, stunned Dempo with two blows to leave the home side dumbfounded.
R C Prakash, from the middle, relayed the ball to Xavier who dribbled past defender Debabrata Roy and beat keeper Laxmikant with an angular drive that found the roof of the net in the 51st minute.
Xavier then outsmarted a couple of rival defenders and from the top of the box drilled an angular shot that beat the keeper all ends up.
J Murali sealed the contest in HAL's favour when his goal- bound shot was diverted into his own net by defender Valeriano Rebello, who was trying to clear the ball to safety.
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