Brijnev ‘tricks in Railways win

Hyderabad, November 27: Indian Railways blanked Andhra 4-0 while hosts Hyderabad trounced Bihar 2-0 to register their third consecutive wi...

Hyderabad, November 27: Indian Railways blanked Andhra 4-0 while hosts Hyderabad trounced Bihar 2-0 to register their third consecutive win in the Group `A’ matches of the National Hockey Championship here on Monday.

In the third match, ITBP defeated SAIL 3-1 with Veer Singh striking in the 7th and 62nd minutes and Raman Kumar scoring in the 67th minute for ITBP. Satvinder Singh, however, reduced the margin for SAIL by hitting through the bars in 68th minute.

Railways and Hyderabad, with three wins and two more games to go, are leading the table.

CISF rout Pondy

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BANGALORE: Central Industrial Security Force overcame early resistance by Pondicherry to hand them a 4-1 drubbing in the Pool B match.

The security forces began on a swift note and took lead in the ninth minute following an indirect penalty-corner conversion. A raid from the right flank saw an infringement on Prateek Kumar as CISF earned their first penalty corner. A cracking shot by Mangra Munda was well blocked by Pondy custodian E Kumaresan but Harish Sharma quickly gathered the rebound to put Munda in possession again. Munda wasted no time and beat the goalkeeper with a measured push.

Pondicherry found the equaliser in the 24th minute when R Anandabalan pushed in the rebound after Senthil Kumar sent a stinging drive off their second penalty corner.

But the securitymen regained the lead into the breather as Mangra Munda struck his second goal, a minute from break and CISF pumped in two more in the second session through Prateek Kumar (40th) and skipper Xaxa (60th) to earn full points with a 4-1 victory.

Dinesh slams four

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CHENNAI: Food Corporation of India, New Delhi downed Kerala 5-2, while International defender Dinesh Naik scored four goals, including a hat-trick, in a row in Tamilnadu’s 8-0 win over Madhya Pradesh in Group C matches on Monday.

Tamilnadu’s technical prowess resulted in their dominating the match. In fact Tamilnadu scored the first three goals in the space of eight minutes.

Dinesh Naik converted four (2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th) of the seven penalty corners that the host team achieved.

Centre forward L Prabhakaran drew first blood in the sixth minute following a tailormade cross by Radhakrishnan. Then Dinesh Naik netted the next four. Cedric D’Cruz (two) and Prabhakaran (one) completed the tally.

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In the FCI-Kerala match, FCI proved better than Kerala who were found wanting in both attack and defence. FCI had their first feel of the Kerala goal with Mandeep Singh converting a penalty corner.

Kuljinder Singh made it two-zero but seven minutes later, Kerala reduced the margin through a `stroke’ converted by Rijesh Kumar. FCI led three-one at the break.

In the second half, Rajiv Panchal and Kuljinder Singh scored the fourth and fifth goals for FCI, while Jayesh netted for Kerala.