Junior National Championship: Jabalpur, MP: Defending champion Punjab and Sind Bank started their campaign in style defeating Hyderabad 4-1 in a Group G match at Police Ground. Giving an exhibition of magnificent stick work, accurate through passes and controlled midfield play P & S Bank surged ahead in the 11th minute when Harjeet Singh sounded the board. Though they continued to dominate the rival’s half and came near to scoring on few occasions but their second goal could come only in the 26th minute when Jarnail Singh found the target.
Undaunted Hyderabad took the full advantage of the laxity of the P&S players towards the half time and pulled back one just before the breather through G Vijay Kumar. Immediately after resumption P&S Bank scored two quick goals within two minutes and consolidated their position. Jagdish Kumar (36th minute) and Harjeet Kumar (37th minute) were the scorers. Both teams got four penalty corners each but none of them could be sent to its proper destination.
Last year runners up UP too emerged as an impressive winner in their opening Group B encounter against Himachal Pradesh at the Ravi Shankar Shukla Stadium. UP won the match 4-0. The scorers were Gaurav Bhardwaj (16th), Imtiaz Ahmed (26th), SN Singh (28th) and H Mohammad (67th). In Group D Services got the batter of Andhra Pradesh 4-1 with Jairam Kujur, A Majhi, Pawan and Vinay Kujur being the scorers. Anjan netted the lone goal for AP.
Host Madhya Pradesh once again gave away spirited display and snatched a point from strong Bengal team in their second league match at the Police Ground. The 1-1 draw kept them in the contention for the knock out phase. Both the teams played sound and solid game and didn’t stretch themselves too much. The scoreboard was reading 0-0 at the half time. It was Bengal to break the deadlock first when center forward Jagdish Gill netted a beautiful field goal in the 44th minute but they couldn’t hang on to the lead for long. In the 59th minute Abhishek got the equalizer for MP. Few minutes later MP got a golden opportunity to surge ahead when they were awarded a penalty stroke but Aslam muffed away this chance. In the first match too against Haryana yesterday, MP wasted a penalty stroke. The other match of this Group between Chhattisgarh and Haryana also ended in a draw.
Delhi, who had lost to Mumbai yesterday narrowly escaped from another reversal in their second Group E match when they blanked Namdhari 2-1. After conceding an early goal in the 9th minute of play, Delhi managed to score a goal in each half. Vikas Toppo and Gurvinder Singh netted for the winner while Damanveer struck for Namdhari. In another match Patiala defeated Mumbai by a solitary goal and moved on top of the Group. The all important goal of the match was scored by center forward Ajay Kumar in the 32nd minute.
New comer Andman & Nicobar suffered another humiliating defeat, this time at the hands of Karnataka. Their 1-25 loss created a record in the championship for the biggest ever defeat. Karnataka center forward KM Chengappa scored 16 goals that included three sets of hat tricks. Earlier in the morning session Karnataka had tasted 1-3 defeat at the hands of Jhharkhand.
A total of 16 matches were played on the second day. Hereunder are the results –
Pool A: Maharashtra drew Bhopal 0-0
Pool B: UP beat HP 4-0
Kerala drew with Bihar 1-1
Pool C: Karnataka beat Andaman & Nicobar 25-1
Manipur beat Gujarat 6-3
Jharkhand beat Karnataka 3-1
Pool D: Services beat AP 4-1
Punjab beat Air India 3-1
Pool E: Delhi beat Namdhari 2-1
Patiala beat Mumbai 1-0
Pool F: Tamil Nadu beat Madhya Bharat 2-0
J & K beat Mizoram 2-1
Pool G: Punjab & Sind Bank beat Hyderabad 4-1
SAIL beat Tripura 3-1
Pool H: Bengal drew MP 1-1