Durand Cup winners list: Mohun Bagan lead on 17, and Sunday’s derby final can level it
Every club and regiment to have won Asia’s oldest football tournament since 1888, updated before Sunday’s final in Kolkata, with the arithmetic check that catches a missing champion.
Aug 31, 2024 · Updated Aug 22, 2026
Mohun Bagan have won the Durand Cup 17 times, more than anyone. East Bengal are one behind on 16. NorthEast United hold it, having won the last two, and on Sunday, 23 August the two Kolkata clubs meet at the Vivekananda Yuba Bharati Krirangan in a final that can move the top of the list for the first time since 2023.
Durand Cup winners list: every club and regiment to have won it
Forty-four teams have won the Durand Cup since the first final in 1888. Titles are listed including shared trophies, which is how the record books count them and why two of the numbers below are doing double duty.
| Team | Titles | Runners-up | Last win |
| Mohun Bagan | 17 | 13 | 2023 |
| East Bengal | 16 | 11 | 2004 |
| Border Security Force | 7 | 2 | 1988 |
| JCT | 5 | 7 | 1996 |
| Black Watch | 5 | 2 | 1920 |
| Highland Light Infantry | 5 | 1 | 1895 |
| Hyderabad City Police / Andhra Pradesh Police | 4 | 3 | 1961 |
| Lancashire Fusiliers | 4 | 2 | 1922 |
| Mahindra & Mahindra / Mahindra United | 3 | 3 | 2008 |
| Churchill Brothers | 3 | 2 | 2011 |
| York and Lancaster Regiment | 3 | 1 | 1930 |
| Salgaocar | 3 | 0 | 2014 |
| South Wales Borderers | 3 | 0 | 1938 |
| Mohammedan | 2 | 4 | 2013 |
| Gorkha Brigade | 2 | 1 | 1969 |
| Border Regiment | 2 | 1 | 1937 |
| Sherwood Foresters | 2 | 1 | 1928 |
| Worcestershire Regiment | 2 | 1 | 1924 |
| Royal Scots | 2 | 1 | 1912 |
| Cameronians (Scottish Rifles) | 2 | 1 | 1907 |
| NorthEast United | 2 | 0 | 2025 |
| Madras Regimental Centre | 2 | 0 | 1958 |
| King’s Shropshire Light Infantry | 2 | 0 | 1933 |
| King’s Own Scottish Borderers | 2 | 0 | 1892 |
| Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders | 1 | 3 | 1936 |
| Chirag United / Prayag United | 1 | 1 | 2010 |
| Army XI / Army Red | 1 | 1 | 2005 |
| Devonshire Regiment | 1 | 1 | 1931 |
| North Staffordshire Regiment | 1 | 1 | 1904 |
| Royal Irish Rifles | 1 | 1 | 1903 |
| Somerset Light Infantry | 1 | 1 | 1896 |
| Royal Scots Fusiliers | 1 | 1 | 1888 |
| Bengaluru | 1 | 0 | 2022 |
| Goa | 1 | 0 | 2021 |
| Gokulam Kerala | 1 | 0 | 2019 |
| Army Green | 1 | 0 | 2016 |
| Air India | 1 | 0 | 2012 |
| Dempo | 1 | 0 | 2006 |
| Kochin | 1 | 0 | 1997 |
| Royal Corps of Signals | 1 | 0 | 1934 |
| Durham Light Infantry | 1 | 0 | 1926 |
| Cheshire Regiment | 1 | 0 | 1923 |
| Royal Dragoons | 1 | 0 | 1905 |
| Hampshire Regiment | 1 | 0 | 1902 |
The check that catches a missing row
Winners lists for a competition this old go wrong in one particular way: a row quietly falls out and nothing on the page looks odd. There is a ten-second test for it. Add up the titles column. It must equal the number of finals played, plus one extra for every final where the trophy was shared, because a shared final hands out two winners rather than one.
The Durand Cup has produced 117 finals up to and including 2025. Three of them were shared. So the titles column has to total 120, and the table above does. The runners-up column works the same way in reverse: 117 finals minus the three with no losing side leaves 114 runner-up places, of which the 44 winners account for 66. The other 48 belong to the 41 teams that reached a final and never won one, the East Lancashire Regiment worst of all with defeats in 1891, 1900 and 1902.
This version of the list has been rebuilt against that check, which is how a row that had been missing from it turned up. Bengaluru won the 2022 final 2-1 against Mumbai City, and the earlier version of this page did not have them.
Two of Mohun Bagan’s 17 are also two of East Bengal’s 16
The three shared finals are the reason the two Kolkata totals sit so close together, and two of the three were this exact fixture. In the 1960 edition Mohun Bagan and East Bengal drew 1-1, replayed on 19 January 1961, drew again 0-0 and were declared joint winners. In 1982 they drew the final 0-0 and shared it again, that one settled on 10 February 1983. The only other shared final was in 1976, when the Border Security Force and JCT could not be separated either.
Strip the shared trophies out and the gap does not change: Mohun Bagan have won it outright 15 times, East Bengal 14. What changes is the texture of the record. Every time a Kolkata derby final has failed to produce a winner, both clubs have been given the cup, and both have counted it ever since.
That cannot happen on Sunday. The 135th Durand Cup has no extra time in the knockout rounds and goes straight from the final whistle to penalties, which is how both semi-finals were decided.
Sunday is the 13th Kolkata derby final, and the first 12 are level
Mohun Bagan and East Bengal have met in 12 Durand Cup finals. Mohun Bagan have won five of them outright, East Bengal have won five outright, and the other two were the shared ones. Five, five and two is the whole history, and it adds to 12.
| Year | Winner | Score |
| 1960 | Shared | 0-0 |
| 1964 | Mohun Bagan | 2-0 |
| 1970 | East Bengal | 2-0 |
| 1972 | East Bengal | 1-0 |
| 1978 | East Bengal | 3-0 |
| 1982 | Shared | 0-0 |
| 1984 | Mohun Bagan | 1-0 |
| 1986 | Mohun Bagan | 1-0 |
| 1989 | East Bengal | 0-0 |
| 1994 | Mohun Bagan | 1-0 |
| 2004 | East Bengal | 2-1 |
| 2023 | Mohun Bagan | 1-0 |
Nine of the 12 finished level or were settled by a single goal, and East Bengal’s 3-0 in the 1978 edition is the only one decided by more than two. Two of the nine needed a replay and one needed penalties: the 1989 final was goalless and East Bengal won the shootout 3-1, which makes it the only Kolkata derby final in the competition’s history to be decided from twelve yards. Given that both semi-finals this month went the same way, it is the most likely precedent for Sunday.
What Sunday does to the winners list
If East Bengal win, they go to 17 and draw level with Mohun Bagan at the top, and they draw level on outright wins too, 15 apiece. It would also end the wait the club has been counting since 2004, when Chandan Das scored twice against Mohun Bagan and the second went in at the death. Nobody in the current East Bengal squad was playing senior football then.
If Mohun Bagan win, they go to 18 and the gap becomes two, which is as clear as it has been since the 1990s. It would be their second in four seasons after the 1-0 win over East Bengal in the 2023 final.
The two have already played each other once this year, in the opening match of the tournament on 25 July at the same ground, and Sahal Abdul Samad settled it 1-0 for Mohun Bagan. East Bengal reached the final by beating Indian Army FT 1-0 through a PV Vishnu header and then edging Sporting Club Delhi 5-3 on penalties. Mohun Bagan needed 18 kicks to get past Jamshedpur in the quarter-final and then beat the holders NorthEast United 4-3 on penalties in Shillong, Vishal Kaith saving two.
The holders won it twice, and nobody had done that in 34 years
NorthEast United beat Mohun Bagan on penalties in the 2024 final after a 2-2 draw, then won the 2025 final 6-1 against Diamond Harbour at the Vivekananda Yuba Bharati Krirangan on 23 August, a year to the day before Sunday’s match. That made them the first club to retain the Durand Cup since East Bengal, who won three in a row from 1989 to 1991.
Three consecutive titles is the record, and four teams hold it jointly. Mohun Bagan have done it twice, in 1963, 1964 and 1965 and again in 1984, 1985 and 1986, which no one else has managed. East Bengal’s run came at the end of the 1980s. The Highland Light Infantry won three straight from 1893 to 1895 and the Black Watch did the same from 1897 to 1899. NorthEast United were trying to join that group this month and lost the semi-final without scoring.
The 135th Durand Cup is not the 135th tournament
Sunday’s match is billed as the final of the 135th edition, and that number is not the number of times the competition has been played. It is closer to the competition’s age. The tournament missed the whole of the First World War, most of the 1940s, the year of the Sino-Indian War in 1962, and four more years between 2015 and 2020.
Count the finals instead and Sunday is the 118th. The gap between the two figures has been exactly 17 for years, and it is worth checking against any edition you like: 2011 was sold as the 124th Durand Cup and was the 107th played, 2022 was billed as the 131st and was the 114th, and 2025 was the 134th and the 117th. Every difference is 17, because the published number stopped tracking the calendar a while ago and now simply goes up by one for each tournament actually staged. Neither number is wrong. They are counting different things, and a winners list that says 135 champions have been crowned is counting the wrong one.
Recent Durand Cup winners
| Year | Winner | Score | Runner-up |
| 2025 | NorthEast United | 6-1 | Diamond Harbour |
| 2024 | NorthEast United | 2-2, 4-3 pens | Mohun Bagan |
| 2023 | Mohun Bagan | 1-0 | East Bengal |
| 2022 | Bengaluru | 2-1 | Mumbai City |
| 2021 | Goa | 1-0 | Mohammedan |
| 2019 | Gokulam Kerala | 2-1 | Mohun Bagan |
| 2016 | Army Green | 0-0, 6-5 pens | NEROCA |
| 2014 | Salgaocar | 1-0 | Pune FC |
| 2013 | Mohammedan | 2-1 | ONGC |
| 2012 | Air India | 0-0, 3-2 pens | Dodsal |
The list above is also the clearest picture of what the competition has become. The eight finals before 2023 were won by eight different teams, and for five of them it is still their only Durand Cup. The Kolkata clubs went 19 years between titles in that stretch, from East Bengal in 2004 to Mohun Bagan in 2023, and now they are playing each other for one.
Common questions about the Durand Cup winners list
Who has won the Durand Cup the most times? Mohun Bagan, with 17 titles, two of them shared with East Bengal. East Bengal are second on 16.
Who are the current Durand Cup holders? NorthEast United, who won the 2025 final 6-1 against Diamond Harbour. They lost the 2026 semi-final to Mohun Bagan on penalties.
When did East Bengal last win the Durand Cup? In 2004, beating Mohun Bagan 2-1. They lost the 2023 final to the same opponents and play them again on Sunday.
How old is the Durand Cup? The first final was played in 1888 at Annadale in Shimla, where the Royal Scots Fusiliers beat the Highland Light Infantry. It is the oldest football tournament in India and one of the oldest anywhere.
For more on the players who came through this competition, see our lists of the greatest Indian footballers of all time and the current India national team squad, and our report on how this year’s quarter-final line-up was decided.
Featured photo: Twitter / Mohun Bagan