India bow out of AFC U-19 Championship

India bowed out of the AFC U-19 Women's Championship China 2015 Qualifiers after suffering a 1-3 loss to Jordan here.
All of Jordan's three goals came of counter-attacks as the Indians were slow to recover after the high line of defence was beaten.
Rasha Khawaled (8th minute), Nour Ayoub (56th) and Lama Alomari (70th) scored for Jordan while Pyari Xaxa pulled one back for India in the 30th minute.
Twice, they were split open as the rivals played over them to find the spare man overlapping. The story had stayed the same even in the first match against Uzbekistan.
India seized the momentum early and lashed a series of attacks on the rival citadel. After some time one lost count of how many were earned. The domination was such that in the first half itself, by the 15th minute, Jordan were defending with nine in the box.

They, nonetheless, had surged into the lead by then. Much against the run of play, India's defence enabled Rasha Khawaled to beat the off-side trap, run ahead and slot it to the left of a diving Panthoi.

Stunned, India further went all out. But the jungle of legs prevented them from having a clear shot, the sole exception being Nikhila's long-ranger which had rival goalkeeper Malak Shannak stretched to the full in the 26th minute.
The equaliser seemed inevitable but India couldn't earn it till them. Eventually India restored parity, also from a brilliant counter attack which started from their own box while defending one of Jordan's rare corners. Rachita initiated the transition and fed Sanju on the left flank. Sanju sprinted past her marker and essayed a perfect cross which caught Malak in two minds. All Pyari had to do was to walk with the ball into an empty net.

That apart, Pyari stayed underutilised as despite all the domination, play wasn't stretched to the flanks in both the halves; in fact, to both the flanks.
Immediately after resumption, India earned a free-kick down the right. The nimble footed Dangmei Grace, who constantly posed a threat was brought down by Rand Abu-Hussein. But the rival defence managed to thwart it.
A couple of minutes later, Ratanbala Devi, all in the clear and with only Malak to beat shot wide; and the very next minute, even as Pyari tried to tap into an almost empty net, she slipped at the time of contact.

And it came back to hit quite painfully as Jordan, again against the run of play took the lead through Nour Ayoub. The defence led to the downfall again - this time too it was played between the defenders and Nour, who didn't take a clue from India's missed chances, tapped home.