Mohun Bagan on Sunday sealed a place in the semi-finals of the 112th IFA Shield football tournament after playing out a goalless draw against China's Shenzen Kingway, which has already made it to the last four of the championship.
Bagan, which needed a draw to enter the semi-finals, could have won the match had its strikers converted even a fraction of the chances that came their way.
Dipendu Biswas missed the easiest chance of the match played under floodlights at the Salt Lake stadium in Kolkata in the 35th minute, when getting a perfect pass from Baretto just a few metres from the goal line, failed to nudge it into the goal with the Shenzen custodian on his knees and hit the ball straight into him.
Biswas was found napping on several other occasions also and wasted some brilliant through passes by Baretto after being adjudged off-side by the referee.
After the breather, he was substituted with star striker Baichung Bhutia, who joined his club today after coming back from the Asian Games, but failed to make much of an impact.
The Chinese club side from Guangdong province, which was busy defending in the first half, came out of their groove after the breather and stirred the Bagan defence on quite a few occasions, but failed to get past the Bagan custodian.
