In the pre-quarterfinal match on the first day of the Basti Soccer League State Level Club Football Tournament 2025 that started in Basti, Northern Football Academy entered the quarterfinals by defeating the host Basti Boys Football team 5-4 in a thrilling match. According to the Head Coach of the academy, Indranil Ghosh, NFA captain Harshit Ojha took the team ahead by scoring a goal on Shadab’s pass. In the second half of the game, Basti Boys scored a goal and brought the score equal to one. Alok Prajapati of NFA gave the team the lead by scoring the second goal on Mahendra’s cross. In the last moments of the match, Basti Boys scored the second goal and at the end of the match there was a tie of 2-2. In the tiebreaker, Northern FA’s Harshit, Shadab, Alok, Mahendra, Abhishek scored goals while only four players from the opposition team could score.

Northern’s goalkeeper Harshit made a beautiful save in the last shot during the tiebreaker and gave the team a 5-4 win. The Northern Football Academy team is as follows: Harshit Ojha (Captain), Aniket Maurya, Vibhuddha Sharma, Srijan Singh, Mahendra, Mohd. Shadab, Nishant Mishra, Jaynath Mishra, Alok Prajapati, Rohit Pandey, Vishesh Gautam, Ayush, Prem, Raja and Head Coach – Indranil Ghosh