Coal India secured a convincing 5-2 win against Varanasi in the Calcutta Premier Division regular season on Thursday evening. The result extends the hosts' recent positive momentum while doing little to alter Varanasi's struggles near the foot of the table.
Coal India started brightly. K. Sarkar opened the scoring in the eighteenth minute, and just before the half-hour mark S. Faiaz doubled the advantage. By then the visitors were already on the back foot, and Varanasi got on the scoreboard through V. Vikas with a penalty at the start of the second half, though an unattributed goal at the same minute suggests the home side had already gone close.
And here's the thing about the way Coal India controlled the middle period — they never let Varanasi settle. B. Hlychho found the net in the sixty-sixth minute, followed almost immediately by S. Roy's strike. A. Mondal added a fourth before the interval ended, and I. Sardar completed the rout with two goals in stoppage time, one in the ninety-minute and another five minutes into injury time.
Coal India sit fourth with twenty-two points from eleven matches, having won six, drawn four and lost just once. Varanasi remain twenty-first with seven points after one win and six defeats. Their recent form tells the story — two consecutive 0-0 draws against Police and Arjan show they cannot create, while the hosts have bounced back from a loss to Calcutta Police with two scores and two clean sheets in five games.
To be fair, the gap in the table was already significant, but this result makes it harder for Varanasi to climb away from the bottom. Coal India can now look toward the teams above them with confidence after ending a run of mixed results with this performance.