Ravi Dhaliwal

Nabha (Patiala), December 27
The way a team plays as a whole determines its success. A hockey squad may have the greatest bunch of individual stars, but if they do not play together the club won’t be worth a dime.

This in essence sums up the performance dished out by North Eastern Railway (NER), Gorakhpur who put up a cohesive effort to rout BEG, Pune 3-0 through the sudden death on day one of the 34th All India Liberals hockey tournament which commenced at the government Ripudaman college ground here today.

The tourney commenced on a sombre note with the organisers paying tributes to their founder member and Senior vice president of theorganising committee M Dugala who passed away recently. If the Railmen put up a unified effort, BEG were guilty of playing a totally disjointed game although the goalless tie at the end of regulation time may tell a different story altogether.

NER could have gone up in the first half itself but Mohammad Kaleem’s reverse flick was well saved by a diving goalkeeper Jhirga Minz. The Gorakhpur outfit enjoyed territorial advantage in a major part of the second half but poor shooting by their forwards ensured that they could not take the all important lead.

Tied goalless at the end of regulation time, the railmen won the contest in the tie breaker with custodian Akhilesh Singh holding his nerves .

In the other match of the day, Dhudike XI packed enough power and punch to down a solid looking SAI, Patiala 2-1, with Sangram Singh scoring a peach of a goal in the dying minutes to take his team into the second round.

SAI, were well served by their forwards Bachitar Singh and Sukhdev Singh, both of whom did duty for the country in the junior Asian championship held at Macau last month, but fell by the wayside due to a totally inept performance in the second half.