Riding on a second half brace by striker Abdul Hakkim, State Bank of Travancore registered a convincing 3-1 victory over Churchill Brothers, Goa, in a National Football League tie for the ONGC Cup at the Corporation stadium in Kozhikode on Saturday.
Both the teams, going for an all-out win to retain their place in the league, were goalless at half-time.
Hakkim opened the scoring three minutes into the second half, as he came up with a powerful strike from a clever pass by Sylvester Ignatius.
Breaking the rival defence at will, Hakkim, later named the man-of-the-match, netted the second goal of the match in the 67th minute after neatly collecting a push from Mohammad Aslam.
With the Goan team resorting to an attacking game, their star striker, Yusif Yakubu of Ghana netted a goal in the 75th minute raising hopes of staging a comeback for the visitors.
Even as Churchill Brothers tried hard to score the equaliser in the closing stages of the game, SBT's Abdul Noushad beat Churchill custodian Marc Mascrenhas by successfully guiding a cross from Hakkim in the 80th minute to seal the issue.
SBT now have eight points, while Churchill Brothers, still in search of a win, are left at the bottom of the table with only two points.
SBT's Paul Antony and Churchill Brothers' Ryan D'Souza were shown the yellow card during the match that once again witnessed a sell-out crowd numbering over 35,000.
