AWK Simple way on my way- Need assistance in bash

I have below data in a file and need output like this - I did in very bad/hard way looking for something smart way.

file1.log:

A  B  C
1  4  6
2  4  4

We should compare col A values i.e is 1 = 2 if so matched else not-matched.

a1=$(awk -F "|" '{print $3}' file1.log|xargs|awk '{print $1}')
a2=$(awk -F "|" '{print $3}' file1.log|xargs|awk '{print $2}')
if [[ "$a1" == "$a2" ]]; then
     echo "MATCHED"
else
     echo "NOT-MATCHED"
fi

Try this command:

awk 'BEGIN {p=""} {if(p==$1) {print "matched"; p=$1} else {print "not matched"; p=$1}}'
 file1.log

You get:

not matched
not matched
not matched

To skip the first line:

awk 'BEGIN {p=""} NR>1{if(p==$1) {print "matched"; p=$1} else {print "not matched"; p=$1}
}' file1.log 

not matched
not matched

You may need to use NR>2 in the above statement. It all depends on what you are trying to do -- your question is not clear as it is.