By Nelson Dafe, Benin City on May 28, 2018

The Edo State Aiteo FA Cup has come to a successful and exhilarating end in Iyanmo town, north of the state capital of Benin City.

In an exciting and largely end-to-end final encounter played on Saturday at the lush green Edo State University playing pitch Iyanmo, Dynamite Force, based in Iyanmo, where they play their NNL home matches, grabbed the bragging rights over fellow professional Division 1 side Bendel Insurance FC of Benin City courtesy of a 1-0 victory.

It was somewhat a reversal of recent fortunes for both teams as Insurance have been the high flying side in the NNL, currently topping the B1 table of the league and looking like hot favorites to gain promotion to the Nigeria Professional Football League (NPFL), which is the elite cadre of Nigerian club football.

For Dynamite, they have been having a lukewarm season so far in the NNL as they are middle of the B2 table, having won their two home games and losing all three away games they have played.

But Iyanmo is proving to be a lucky home for the newcomers to the NNL and they showed Insurance why, with strong support from the Iyanmo fans pushing them across the finish line.

The first half was a cagey and evenly contested affair, but Dynamite broke the deadlock in the second half with about 20 minutes left on the clock courtesy of a brilliant header from Omatseyin Thompson off a corner kick.

Insurance were rattled.

Tried as they did to get back into the game, Dynamite held firm to win the Edo state FA cup and avenge their final loss to Insurance last year.

Both teams will represent Edo State in the national Federations Cup scheduled for later this year.

Meanwhile, for the Edo State FA it was a good end to a competition which they put their best to make a success. 

Apart from a general consensus that this year's Edo FA Cup competition was markedly better in the area of communication between the FA and participating clubs, there was also another first.

Never before had an Edo FA Cup match been played outside of Benin City, a situation which had denied many from other parts of the state from getting a feel of the excitement of the competition. 

But this year the biggest match of the tournament was taken outside of Benin City and people from the north of Edo state joined the Edo deputy governor Philip Shaibu and immediate past Edo state FA chairman and current chairman of Owan West local government council Frank Ilaboya to witness the final showpiece.

•Photo shows Dynamite midfielder John Idahor proudly holding the Edo FA Cup won by his team

Source Daily Sports

Posted May 28, 2018

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