Nepali U-15 football team faced a humiliating 7-0 defeat against hosts India in the final of the fifth SAFF U-15 Championship at the Kalyani stadium in West Bengal on Saturday.

Sridarth Nongmeikapam completed a hat-trick for India guiding the hosts to a comfortable victory. Maheson Singh, Sibajit Singh, Himanshu Jangra and Amandeep were also on scoresheet. The defeat was a big blow to Nepal’s quest of winning the title for the first time. Nepal have lost to the same opponents in two previous finals — 1-0 in 2013 and 2-1 in 2017 edition.

Maheson opened the scoring in the 15th minute before Amandeep doubled the advantage in the 41st. India went into break with 3-0 lead after Sibajit added another in the stoppage time of the first half. Nepal’s hopes of coming into the game faded in early second half as Sridarth added their fourth in the 52nd minute.

Himanshu capitalised a pass from Taison Singh to score a fifth in the 65th. Sridarth scored his second and India’s sixth in the 76th minute and completed his hat-trick in the 80th minute.Nepal had started their campaign with a 5-0 defeat against India in the opening match on August 21 before winning their remaining matches to make into the final. Nepal had defeated Sri Lanka 2-0 on August 23, Bangladesh 4-1 on August 27 and thrashed Bhutan 6-0 on August 29. India had made to the final as table toppers and Nepal as runners up during the round robin league which was participated by five South Asian countries. India, who have made a rapid stride in the senior men’s football in the past few years, showed their progress in the youth football as well scoring 28 goals in five matches and maintaining clean-sheet.

Their biggest win was against Nepal in the final and Bhutan in the group stage with a similar score-line of 7-0. The least goals they scored was during 4-0 victory against Bangladesh. With seven goals under his name, Himanshu became the top scorer in the tournament. Nepal have never won the title in five editions since its inception in 2011.

The tournament was played as the SAFF U-16 Championship for the first three editions on biennial basis. Since 2017 it turned as an annual U-15 tournament. India is most successful team of the tournament having won the title for record three times. Bangladesh have won twice while Pakistan won the inaugural edition.