Karvan defeated Zagatala 3-0 at home in the third round of the Birinci Deste regular season on Wednesday afternoon. The hosts moved into fifth place with three points from two matches, while Zagatala remained third on four points despite the defeat. And here's the thing — this wasn't a match decided by possession or shots, but by three decisive moments.
It started badly for the visitors. E. Mammadov received a red card in the sixth minute, leaving Zagatala to play with ten men for the remainder of the contest. To be fair, the hosts didn't waste the advantage. I. Aliev found the net just three minutes later, in the ninth minute, and the game was effectively over by then.
I remember watching that second goal carefully — Aliev struck again in the twenty-second minute. The visitors had pulled themselves back together after the dismissal, but they couldn't recover from the early deficit. By then it was already clear this would be a routine afternoon for Karvan, who had lost their opening fixture against Shakdag 2-0.
E. Mustafayev added a third goal in the forty-fifth minute plus three, closing out the scoring before half-time. Zagatala had shown promise earlier in the season with a draw against Energetik and a win over Bakı Sportinq, but this was a different performance altogether. The visitors were left flat-footed and couldn't mount any meaningful response.
The result means Zagatala's unbeaten run came to an end, though they remain in third place with only two games played. Karvan bounced back from their opening loss to take maximum points from a match where they were second to everything for the first six minutes.
