Junior National Championship:

Jabalpur, MP: Host Madhya Pradesh made a promising beginning to their campaign when they beat sturdy Haryana 2-0 convincingly in a Group H encounter on the opening day of the 33rd Junior National Championship here at the Ravi Shankar Shukla Stadium. Playing cautiously but purposefully MP scored a goal each in either half and earned full marks. They took the lead in the 15th minute with a field goal through Hasan and then consolidated it with another fine field goal scored by Abhishek Srivas in the 47th minute of play. Haryana tried their best to salvage some prestige but their efforts proved in futile as MP defenders showed much grit and alacrity. Left Back Gunendra and Left Half Nafees were outstanding for the home team.

The 33rd Junior National Championship got off to a flying start as a total of 15 matches were played on the opening day at four different places in two sessions. In Group A Orissa stamped their superiority over Bhopal by winning comfortably with a margin of 6 goals to one while Chandigarh got the better of Maharashtra 3-1 in the same Group. For Orissa, international Left Back Bernard Lakra and Left In Theodore Samad played beautifully and never let their rivals to dictate terms.

Himachal Pradesh handed out a stunning 1-0 defeat to Bihar. Dharamvir netted the all important goal for the winner in the 42nd minute in a Group B encounter. Kerala got walk over from Assam in this group to gain full points. In Group C Andman & Nicobar suffered a humiliating 23-0 defeat at the hands of powerful Jharkhand. Center forward Akhoo Kumar scored first hat trick of the tournament and a total of seven goals in the match. In another Group C match Karnataka scrapped past Manipur 3-0.

Both the matches played in Group D were one sided affair. Mighty Punjab virtually had no difficulty in thrashing out Uttranchal 7-0 while Air India also showed no mercy in teaching lesson to Andhra Pradesh with 5-0 drubbing. Air India captain Deepak Kumar scored three goals in a dominant display. Bhakt and Sanjay Yadav netted one each to complete the tally.

Group E witnessed best of the competition of the day. Delhi fought bravely before going down to Mumbai 1-0 in the first match of the after noon session, played on the Science College Ground while in the second match Rajasthan also gave a torrid time to Patiala before tasting a defeat by a margin of 3-4. In other matches of the day Jammu & Kashmir defeated Madhya Bharat 3-0 in Group F, SAIL trounced Hyderabad 3-0 in Group G and Bengal overcame Pondichery 1-0 in Group H.

A total of 39 teams are taking part in this tournament and they are divided in eight groups. The matches are being played on the grass.