LAHORE, Dec 4 Pakistan lost the opener to Sri Lanka 1-0 as the South Asian Football Championship kicked off at Dhaka's Bangabandhu National Stadium on Friday.

According to information received here, Amjad Iqbal, missed a golden opportunity of scoring the equalizer in the 88th minute as he missed a penalty-kick.

Chatura Maduranga, the Sri lankan skipper and his long time attacking partner Kasuna Jayasurriya led the Sri Lankan onslaught.

1995 gold medallist Maduranga struck the solitary goal of the match through midfielder Chathura Gunaratne in the 25th minute. The Lankans kept their lead intact despite marching orders for Dimudu Hettiarachchi in the 86th minute.

“We are here to win the title and take every match seriously, the first match was very important to the build up of the tournament and we had the firepower to be the best in the tournament, but luck eluded us as we fumbled a golden opportunity, missing a spot-kick. We wanted to start with a win but missed chances cost us the match,” said Pakistan coach George Kottan, an Austrian.

“I hope my five England based players Amjad Iqbal, Atif Bashir, Adnan Farooq, Shabir Khan, Reis Ashraf will put up an improved performance in the remaining matches to boost team morale and we will go all out to gain full six points from the next two league games,” he further remarked.

Sampath Perera, the Sri Lankan coach was looking forward to put in the experience of his players who are playing together for a couple of years. “The players are eager to show their potential and Sri Lanka is focussed to win the title after a lapse of 14 years, we are ready to answer fire with fire,” said Perera.

Saturday fixtures

Maldives v Nepal; India v Afghanistan.