entered the tournament defeating Punjab Police, the winners of North Zone qualifying round, 4–3 in penalties that followed a 1–1 draw on field, in the round of 16, before meeting Churchill Brothers in the quarter-final. Against them he employed the 3–2–3–2 'diamond' formation, a formation that he had introduced in the same year. The formation had seven players often attacking at the same time; Debjit Ghosh was played as a defensive screen while Basudeb Mondal was played as a deep-lying playmaker. Amit Das played just behind Chima Okorie while Abdul Khalique started on the wings and drifted in as the match progressed. With this formation, his team had pulverised Churchill Brothers, beating them 6–0. Dutta had also come to be known for his provocation and trash talk before matches, and before this game had mocked East Bengal's striker Bhutia as "Chung Chung" and dismissed defender Sammy Omollo saying, "I will eat him like an omelette". The coach of East Bengal, Banerjee, had the reputation as a pragmatist and was known for playing easily adaptable football with popular players to win games, much unlike Dutta. Known for his defensive tactics, which he called the Italian Catenaccio style of play, he regularly fielded 4–3–3 and 4–5–1 formations. He also came to be known for his inspirational pep talk to players termed as "vocal tonic" before games. His team entered the tournament as defending champions and met winners of the South Zone qualifying round, Integral Couch Factory, in the Round of 16. Defeating them 3–0, they met Mohammedan in the quarter-final, who they beat 4–0, to enter the semi-final. In the fortnight before the game, although East Bengal were yet to beat Mohammedan in the quarter-final on 6 July to earn the right to play Mohun Bagan next, Dutta, and his counterpart, Banerjee, made statements about tactics their teams would adopt for the game. Rediff.com reported: "The atmosphere grew more and more tense as the match day approached. Tickets were sold in black, though the police did its best to dissuade fans from dealing with touts." The derby always drew unprecedented crowds whenever and wherever played, and there had been many instances of violence in the past involving players, team officials and supporters. This led to Dutta appealing for a foreign referee to supervise the game and eventually a FIFA referee, Inayatullah Khan, was called in. Match A record crowd of 131,781 had