AIFF Media Team

KOLKATA: There are many reasons to fall in love with the ‘Beautiful Game’, but its ability to give jaw-dropping, adrenaline rushing moments remains unparalleled. Be it last second winners or sublime trickery, nothing comes close to leaving jaws wide open between two hands than early goals.

The Hero I-League witnessed its fastest goal ever in history in the TRAU vs Real Kashmir FC match played on Sunday (January 10, 2021). TRAU’s Tajik National Team striker Komron Tursunov’s venomous strike from outside the box in the 9th second etched his name in the history books. His strike was 4 seconds quicker than the record held by Katsumi Yusa of 13 seconds against Churchill Brothers in the 2018-19 season.

The goal currently stands as the fastest goal in Indian top tier League football.

And Komron did come close to the fastest ones ever scored. Comparatively, the fastest goals in the English Premier League is 7.69 seconds, while in La Liga and Serie A it is 7.82 and 6 seconds respectively. Meanwhile, the Bundesliga shares its fastest goal scored with the Hero I-League at 9 seconds.

For the Tajik forward, the goal was more about taking a half chance. “You can say that. My job is to help my team and coach. My coach has told me, “Komron, I need goals from you.” I saw it, and had to pull the trigger. That’s my job,” he stated. “I saw a yawning gap and thought to myself, why not? As a striker, you need to take on those half-chances.”

Leaving no stone unturned in his praise for the Tajik, TRAU coach Nandakumar said: “It was according to our training routine and we knew how to execute it. It was all according to our game plan and I am satisfied that it worked out perfectly. Credit where it’s due, Tursunov striker was a thing of beauty and I am very happy to have a player who can score absolute bangers in my team”

Real Kashmir’s David Robertson believes that the early goal caught them off guard. “I have never seen a goal as early as that in my career and a goal like that is very difficult to come back from. A goal as early as that puts you on the back foot and chasing the match from the first minute isn’t the best thing to do in the first game of the season. It just shows you how exciting the league is.”