In what just might be the last season of the I-League, the country's top-division football tournament has reached a fitting final day of the 2017-18 season. Four teams are in contention to win the annual league competition on the final day—a first in its history.
Two points separate the top four teams—Minerva Punjab, NEROCA FC, Mohun Bagan and East Bengal—with three games to be played on Thursday. There are a total of 27 permutations that could decide which way the title goes. The AIFF ensured that the three matches will kickoff simultaneously in a bid to avoid match-fixing.
Minerva Punjab, which finished second from bottom in the 2016-17 season, leads the pack with 32 points. They will play Churchill Brothers and a victory will seal their first I-League title.
Manipur's NEROCA is a point behind Minerva. The I-League debutants will hope to emulate the success scripted by lowly northeast neighbours Aizawl FC, when the Mizo team won the league last year.
NEROCA will face the mighty East Bengal in their final game, and hope that the Churchill Brothers inflict some damage on Minerva, to gift the football fraternity another fairytale northeast victory tale.
Then come the two Kolkata giants. Mohun Bagan is in third with 30 points, the same as East Bengal albeit with a better goal difference. Bagan will be up against Kerala's Gokulam, and should the two teams above slip up, it would give the Mariners an opportunity to win its fifth national league title.
But, if East Bengal, which are level on points and only one goal short of their bitter Kolkata rivals goal difference, manage to crush NEROCA by a huge margin, and see Minerva lose, the trophy will be handed over to the red and gold brigade.
For a league that has been shunned to the fringes ever since the start of the blockbuster Indian Super League, the I-League has displayed some incredible matches and contests this season.
The future of the league still hangs in the balance with the possibility of merger with the ISL to be worked out this year. It could make the ISL the top tier of Indian football and relegate most of the current I-League teams to a new second division, but the details are still unclear.
The top six teams in the league will face their ISL counterparts in the Super Cup to be held next month. Aizawl and Shillong Lajong are currently in fifth and sixth, but Gokulam, in seventh, could upset the latter with a win today.
Matches:
Minerva Punjab vs Churchill Brothers
NEROCA FC vs East Bengal
Mohun Bagan vs Gokulam
All games will kickoff at 3pm IST.