Punjab are National football champs

Punjab lifted the Santosh Trophy, the symbol of supremacy in the National Football Championship, after 18 years, beating West Bengal 5-3 via the penalty shoot-out in the final in Gurgaon on Wednesday.

Full-time ended goalless.

Parveen Kumar, Jaspal Singh, Narinder Singh, Daljit Singh and Harpreet Singh scored for Punjab, while Dipendu Biswas, Sanjiv Maria and Shyam Mandal converted their kicks for Bengal.

Bengal's Suman Dutta failed to score in the shoot-out, his shot blocked by Punjab goalkeeper Kamleshwar Singh.