New Road Team (NRT) vaulted back to top tier football, while Chyasal Youth Club claimed the Martyrs Memorial ‘B’ Division League football title on Tuesday.

NRT, a club that carries a long history in Nepali league football, had opted out of ‘A’ Division citing financial crisis and were automatically relegated to the second tier. But in a crucial match at the APF Headquarters in Halchowk, they overcame Satdobato Youth Club 2-0 to resume their ‘A’ Division journey.

The victory meant Chyasal, who were already promoted and eyeing the ‘B’ Division League title to wrap up their fairytale journey, needed at least a five-goal margin victory against Bansbari and they did exactly that with a crushing 5-0 win. Both NRT and Chyasal finished with 25 points from 13 matches but the latter ended up winners on goal difference. 

In a match where a draw would have been sufficient, NRT went ahead in the first half with a 42nd minute goal from Bishowjit Gurung. Satdobato, needing an outright victory to secure promotion, went two goals down after Gurung struck again in the 71st minute.

NRT were right on track for promotion with an emphatic victory after they were awarded a penalty in the dying moments but skipper Prabin Kumar Sainju shot wide off the target. NRT assistant coach Shyam Mali said it was mission accomplished.

“Our only target was to get ourselves back in the top tier football and we managed to do that. The road to promotion was tougher than we had expected,” said Mali adding the club will do everything needed to establish club in the ‘A’ Division one more time. “The club withdrew from the league last time due to financial crisis but that is past

now. The management has assured us that history will not repeat itself.”

Satdobato coach Sanoj Shrestha was content with his boys’ performance despite losing a golden opportunity to write history by one step. “We are satisfied with the fourth place finish because we came into the league without experienced players. Even a draw was not enough for us to get promotion. Our boys did work very hard in getting to the place where we are today,” said Shrestha.

There were contrasting celebrations for two big winners of the day as Chyasal got an opportunity to head into the top tier as the proud winners of ‘B’ Division. Binod KC opened the scoring against a hapless Bansbari side, one-time ‘A’ Division team, in the 20 seconds and the carnage continued as Chyasal added goals through a Madhav Bhandari brace and one each from Rabin Byanjankar and Indra Jung Limbu.

In an inconsequential match of the day, Tushal Youth Club defeated Boys Union Club 3-2 rallying from two goals down. Samajik Youth Club and Mahabir Club are the two that have already confirmed their demotion.