Dejan Drazic chipping a stranded goalkeeper from thirty yards. Javi Siverio outjumping his marker and the onrushing keeper to thump a header into goal. Sandesh Jhingan and his Spanish twin-in-spirit Pol Moreno Sanchez throwing themselves into block after block. Borja Herrera keeping the ball under extreme pressure and creating a chance here and a chance there. Hrithik Tiwari holding onto the ball with calm authority. Udanta Singh running his socks off... For one and a half odd hours at the Fatorda, Indian club football was normal, and good, and happy.
These are not words we are using these days when talking about Indian club football, going as they are through an unprecedented, existential crisis.
Good. Happy. Winning. What?
FC Goa rocked up to their qualifier for the AFC Asian Champions League 2 group stages against Oman's Al Seeb on Wednesday with no domestic league in the immediate future, a twenty-day pre-season, and a recently 'mutually-terminated'-from-national-team coach... and ground their more fancied opponents to dust.
They were helped by Al Seeb keeper Ahmed Al Rawahi cosplaying Manuel Neuer and failing spectacularly, and a penalty decision that ought really to have been given a penalty against them but consider everything that they're going through and it'd take a hard heart (or an Al Seeb fan) to begrudge them these turns of in-game fortune.
The match itself was pretty absorbing. Goa soaked up pressure from the Omani side, especially down the wings, but stayed compact centrally. New signings Moreno and David Timor Copovi added a no-nonsense steel to their game in those areas, with only Drazic given an element of freedom within this rigid structure. That liberty soon paid dividends, when in the 24th minute, Drazic broke in behind and easily outpaced Al Rawahi to the ball before chipping him and the backtracking defenders into the open goal. The Fatorda exploded, the 12,000 plus in attendance (despite the heavy rains in Panjim) making their presence felt.
Al Seeb, filled with players from an Oman national still battling for a place at the 2026 World Cup, forced the game to revert to attack vs defence for the rest of the half as they penned Goa into their own half, but they couldn't really trouble Tiwari in goal. A minute before half time, though, Drazic seemed to have handled the ball inside the box. Somehow, the referee and his linesman consulted with each other and gave the Oman side a freekick outside the box.
Coming out for the second half, Goa pushed the game a little further up the pitch, but it was from a counter that Drazic forced the second meaningful act of the game. Once again sprinting in behind, Drazic produced a dazzling dribble and shot that won Goa a corner. Borja Herrera swung one into the box, Al Rawahi came flapping, and Siverio bullied his marker and outjumped the floundering keeper to thump a clean header into goal.
The goal that sent us into the AFC Champions League 2! �� pic.twitter.com/oAAZmbu5Z6
- FC Goa (@FCGoaOfficial) August 13, 2025
On the hour mark, though, Al Seeb silenced a raucous Fatorda through a superbly worked goal: Zahir Al Aghbari ripping down the left and finding Nasser Al Rawahi who nipped in front of Jhingan and Moreno to finish cleverly. You could sense the tension in air through the screen, as everyone in Goa orange prepared for the onslaught... but it never came. Marquez's defensive shape and astute tactics, coupled with the hard running of his men on the field and some loose passing in build-up from Al Seeb, ensured that all Tiwari had to do was not make a mistake when a regulation shot was taken at goal. And he didn't.
As the final whistle blew, everyone raced onto the field, staff, coaches, and players hugging each other and you could see Indian men's football breathe again. Even if temporarily.
In a year where Indian women's football has given plenty of joy, thanks to the national teams' despite-apathy qualification to the senior and junior AFC Asian Cups amid all the chaos and confusion, Indian men's football has something to smile about finally. FC Goa now join Mohun Bagan (direct entrants as ISL winners) in the group stages of the AFC Asian Champions League 2. They will play six matches each, three at home, three away.
Meanwhile, even as Goa were winning, the AIFF tweeted that they had asked its legal counsels to sit with their ISL counterparts and "hold discussions". This, a few days after they held a meeting with the clubs and FSDL (the Reliance backed body that runs the ISL) and after the AIFF president made it abundantly clear that it was "not their fault" that the ISL is suspended right now. So, while the "discussions" go on, the very real and very ridiculous possibility exists (as it stands) that these six might be the only proper matches these two clubs play all season. Just imagine that.
And that's why this win means just that bit more than qualification for a big continental competition, a bit more than beating a tough West Asian opponent (ever a tough proposition), a bit more than improving India's co-efficient within the AFC. It's Indian club football telling its masters that despite their best worst efforts, the ball will keep getting kicked, happiness will keep being searched for, and new horizons will keep being explored.