Scholar High School (Colaba) were a depleted lot, but they managed to put a strong challenge before going down 0-2 to Gopi Birla School (Walkeshwar) in their Mumbai Schools Sports Association (MSSA)-organised boys' U-16 Division IV inter-school football tournament at Azad Maidan yesterday.

Striker Nisarg Patel scored a brace for Gopi Birla. The Colaba side could only field 10 players as eight of their regular members were unavailable due to their chemistry exam. "I could not help it. I was forced to play the game with whatever players were available," Scholar coach Ameya Virkar told mid-day. "Since the boys had their exams, I requested the MSSA to postpone the game, but they said that it was impossible due to the tight schedule," he added.