NEW DELHI: India were announced joint winners of the SAFF Women's Under-19 Football Championships alongside hosts Bangladesh, following an unprecedented change in decision by match officials in Dhaka on Thursday.
The match concluded with a 1-1 score-line after the regulation 90 minutes, prompting the referee to order a direct penalty shootout.
Interestingly, all 11 players from both teams, including the goalkeepers, successfully converted their penalty kicks.
After the scoreline reached 11-11, the referee was about to continue the penalty shootout when she was told not to do that.
Suddenly, she called in the captains of the two sides and the toss of the coin was done. India were the lucky side to win the toss of coin and they celebrated.
The Bangladeshis protested and their players refused to leave the field of play for a long time.
There was confusion and pandamonium all along and the sizeable crowd were seen throwing a few bottles onto the field and shouting slogans.
After more than one hour, the match commissioner, who initially took the decision for tossing the coin, changed his decision and India and Bangladesh were declared joint winners.
"It was a good gesture from the All India Football Federation. We accepted the decision to declare both sides as joint winners," an AIFF source told PTI.
There was confusion on the part of the match officials regarding the tournament rules, which led to the unprecedented scenes.
(With inputs from PTI)
