Bangladesh’s dreams of a final’s berth in the SAFF Championship after 18 years is still very much alive halfway into their semifinal bout against Kuwait, as the match at the Sree Kanteerava Stadium in Bengaluru, India stands 0-0 at halftime on Saturday.
Bangladeshi players stepped up against Kuwait, who are 51 slots ahead of them in the FIFA rankings, in a first half where both sides had their fair share of chances to score but failed to draw first blood.
The first and perhaps the best chance of the first 45 minutes of the match belonged to Bangladesh, when Sheikh Morsalin found himself in a 1v1 situation against the Kuwait goalkeeper.
Rakib Hossain burst through the right wing, wiggled past Kuwait’s left-back before sending a cross to Morsalin, who was waiting in the d-box all alone.
However, Morsalin, who had scored in Bangladesh’s previous two matches, rushed his right-footed attempt which went straight to the goalkeeper.
The fierce shot deflected from the keeper and returned to Morsalin but this time two Kuwaiti defenders were there to not allow Morsalin the room to unleash a second shot.
The rest of the half saw a lively back and forth contest, with Kuwait coming close to scoring multiple times and Bangladesh also looking threatening in counter –attacks.
But in a sunny afternoon in Bengaluru, both sides had to end the first half without anything to show for their efforts.