The 2018–19 Minerva Punjab FC Season was the club's third season in the

I-League The I-League is the men's second professional football division of the Indian football league system behind the Indian Super League. Administered by the All India Football Federation, it is currently contested by 13 clubs. It operates as a s ...

Transfers

Minerva Punjab saw an exodus of top players after their

victory in the 2017 season. Perhaps the biggest departure that Minerva Punjab was that of

Chencho Gyeltshen Chencho Gyeltshen (Dzongkha: བཙན་སྐྱོགས་རྒྱལ་མཚན; born 10 May 1996) is a Bhutanese professional footballer who plays as a forward for the Bhutan national team. Gyeltshen is the all-time leading internation ...

. The Bhutanese attacker was the stand-out performer for Minerva in 2017 and was subsequently sold to

Bengaluru FC Bengaluru Football Club () (Kannada: ಬೆಂಗಳೂರು.ಎಫ್.ಸಿ) is an Indian professional football club based in Bengaluru, Karnataka. The club competes in the Indian Super League, the top flight of Indian football. The club w ...

. His departure left a huge gap in the Minerva squad. Following Chencho out of the door were Kiran Chemjong, Sukhdev Singh, Kamalpreet Singh, Bali Gagandeep, Kassim Aidara, Girik Khosla, Rakshit Dagar, and Abhishek Ambekar. Kamalpreet Singh, Gagandeep, Aidara, and Rakshit Dagar all signed for Minerva's title rivals

East Bengal F.C. East Bengal Football Club, commonly referred to as East Bengal, is an Indian professional football club based in Kolkata, West Bengal. The club competes in the Indian Super League, the top flight of the Indian football league system. The cl ...

Sukhdev Singh and Ambekar moved on to Mohun Bagan. Ahead of the 2018-19 I-League season, Minerva were left with a depleted squad. On 6 July 2018 Minerva Punjab signed forward Yu Kuboki on a permanent transfer from Australian club

Sydney Olympic FC Sydney Olympic Football Club is an Australian semi-professional soccer club, based in Belmore, Sydney, New South Wales, that plays in the National Premier Leagues NSW. The club was founded as Pan-Hellenic Soccer Club in 1957 by Greek immigrant ...

. He had been in scintillating form for

Sydney Sydney is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales and the List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city in Australia. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Syd ...

the previous season, scoring 11 goals in 22 matches as an attacking midfielder or a withdrawn striker. In August 2018 Minerva signed three players including Nigerian forward Philip Njoku. In September 2018 they signed former

Ozone FC Ozone Football Club Bengaluru (simply known as Ozone FC) was an Indian professional association football, football club based in Bengaluru, Karnataka. Founded in 2015, the club competed in BDFA Super Division, the top division of football in th ...

striking duo C. S. Sabeeth and Brazilian Robert De Souza. They also extended contracts with defender

Akashdeep Singh Akashdeep Singh (born 2 December 1994) is an Indian field hockey player who plays as a forward for Uttar Pradesh Wizards in the Hockey India League and the India hockey team. Career Born in Verowal, Tarn Taran, Punjab, Singh started to play ...

and striker Akash Sangwan.

Contract extension

In

Out

Squad

First-team squad

Team management

:''As of 9 August 2018.''

Pre-season and friendlies

Minerva Punjab kicked off their pre-season preparations by participating in the 2018 Punjab State Super Football League from 26 August 2018. With 4 wins and 3 draws Minerva finished second in the league table. They beat league leader

FC Punjab Police Punjab Police Football Club (formerly Punjab Police Club; nicknamed "The Policemen") is an Indian institutional multi-sports club based in Jalandhar, Punjab (India), Punjab. Affiliated with the Punjab Football Association, club's football (socc ...

in the finals to win the 32nd

Punjab State Super Football League The Punjab State Super League (simply known as the Punjab Super League or the JCT Punjab Super League) is an Indian top state football leagues in India, state-level regional Association football, football league in the state of Punjab, India, P ...

title.

Punjab State Super League

;Notes

J&K Invitational Cup

Minerva Punjab participated in the J&K Invitational Cup organized by

Real Kashmir FC Real Kashmir Football Club is an Indian professional football club based in Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir. Incorporated in 2016, the club predominantly competes in I-League, the second tier of Indian football league system. Real Kashmir with it ...

. It was a knock out tournament. ;Notes

Friendlies

Competitions

I-League

Matches

League table

Results summary

Results by round

2019 AFC Champions League

The

AFC Champions League The AFC Champions League Elite (abbreviated as the ACL Elite) is an annual continental club association football, football competition organised by the Asian Football Confederation, and contested by Asia's List of top-division football clubs i ...

is the premier continental football competition organized by the

Asian Football Confederation The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) is the governing body of association football, beach soccer, and futsal in most countries and territories in Asia. The AFC was formed in 1954. It has 47 members. The Asian Ladies Football Confederation ( ...

(AFC). As the champions of the

the previous season, Minerva Punjab FC earned a chance to qualify for the tournament. India did not have a direct-entry spot in the AFC Champions League and thus the champion team from India had to qualify for the tournament through the preliminary rounds. Minerva Punjab were put up against Saipa FC of

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

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