31st October, Jalandhar: Delhi in the semis of the National Hockey Championship? Either we should be kidding or living in the 60s or 70s to think so. But it is true now. In an otherwise lacklustre Dainik Baskar-Tracer National Championship being staged here amidst poor stands and without much fanfare, Delhi state team set the Olympian Surjit Singh stadium turf on flame to post a memorable win (3-1) over highflying Air India here on Tuesday to enter the semifinals for the first time in 30 years.
Two sterling matches in 20 hours gap gave Delhi the historical turn around. Led by hardworking Bikas Toppo, Delhi came out with flying colours against Mumbai on Monday (5-4) and then on Tuesday afternoon, managed to post three goals against Air India’s late lone goal to garner another three valuable points in the Super League. Thus two wins in as many days took the State to semis where they will lock horns with another emerging power in the domestic scene, Namdharis, on Thursday. The young Namdharis tamed the biggies in the trade Punjab and Indian Airlines on identical 1-0 scoreline for their moments of joy.
Its decades since the Delhi’s senior team made any mark on the national stage. Since losing the two-leg semifinals in the 1977 Chennai Nationals, Delhi had even been struggling to post reasonable scorers, not to speak of victories. Against the backdrop, the forming of team by Punjab National Bank three years ago, proved to be the saviour. 15 out of 18 players representing Delhi here are from the rolls Punjab National Bank and the winning outfit here is also sponsored by PNB.
Incidentally, Delhi Manager here Ashok Sharma, a PNB officer, was the inside-right of Delhi in 1977 Channai Nationals where the mighty Railways with legends like Harbinder Singh, Michael Kindo, Virender Singh, Baskaran brothers, Ajit Singh and others on its rank, had no problem in steamrolling Delhi. “Am thrilled with this win, because as a player I was in the semis, and after so much gap my team scales the same height”, Ashok Sharma reflected.
Delhi dominated the proceedings from the word go against Air India. Its dragflicker Jitender Sharda converted the team’s first penalty corner in the third minute. Air India, despite valiant in defence, anchored by Len Aiyappa, stood to the task against the marauding Delhites, but succumbed to sustained pressure midway through the second half. Captain Bikas Toppo and energetic Promod Kumar punctured them once apiece in a 7-minute blitzkrieg between 45th and 52nd minutes.
Air India woke up in the 52nd minute with a Burn Lugun’s free hit deflection, but that was too little in long time to make up the arrears. Air India earned nine penalty corners, two at the dying the moments, but Len’s flicks were easily anticipated by the trio of Ajitesh Rai, Jasbir Singh (Goalkeeper) and Jitender Sharda.
Air India was handicapped without its star players, as four of them were not released from the Rourkela national camp and their player Praveen Kumar was seriously injured in the second half. For that offence Delhi’s Damandeep Singh got a red card suspension from umpire Satinder Sharma. This umpire also provided a comical stuff at the fag end of the match when he stopped the play to count how many players were sitting on the Delhi bench only to find out everything was in order!