The Hindu: Indian Oil in final

Captain Deepak Thakur struck twice in the last four minutes as Indian Oil recorded a thrilling 5-3 win over Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) and booked a berth in the final of the 121st Beighton Cup hockey tournament at the SAI Complex here on Monday.

Indian Oil will meet Bharat Petroleum, which defeated defending champion Punjab National Bank (PNB) 5-2 in the other semifinal, in the summit clash on Tuesday.

In a neck-and-neck fight between the two oil teams, Indian Oil snatched lead through V.R. Raghunath’s 26th minute penalty corner conversion.

Two minutes later, drag-flicker Diwakar Ram scored the equaliser in a similar fashion to maintain the deadlock at half-time.

Indian Oil again grabbed lead through striker Roshan Minz’s 45th minute effort but ONGC replied strongly through goals by Gurbaj Singh (55) and Vikramjit Singh (62nd) to wrest lead eight minutes from the hooter.

ONGC’s joy was short-lived as Gurjinder Singh drew parity in the 64th minute before Thakur sealed win by scoring in 66th and 70th minutes.

The results:

Semifinals: Indian Oil 5 (Deepak Thakur 2, V.R. Raghunath, Roshan Minz, Gurjinder Singh) bt ONGC 3 (Diwakar Ram, Gurbaj Singh, Vikramjit Singh).

Bharat Petroleum 5 (S.V. Sunil 4, Jarnail Singh) bt PNB 2 (Shamsher, Gagandeep Singh).