BPCL derails Central Railway to book semifinal berth

Mumbai, Apr 15 (UNI) BPCL today scored a hard fought 4-2 victory over local side Central Railway in a Pool 'A' league match, to enter the semifinals in the 46th All India Bombay Gold Cup hockey tournament, played at the Mahindra stadium here today.

In an inconsequential match in the same pool, Hyderabad XI beat their southern neighbours Tamil Nadu XI by 3 goals to 1. Both the teams had already crashed out of the tournament with no chance of making to the semis.

BPCL held the upper hand in their match against Central Railway and they took the lead in the 20th minute through Jarnail Singh, who scooped the ball into the net following a goal mouth melee.

BPCL consolidated their lead 10 minutes later when Gurpreet Singh scored with a drag flick from their first penalty corner.

Central Railway, however fought back with goals through Rajeev Bhatkar and Naveen Kumar early in the second half to raise their hopes of putting it across the strong BPCL outfit.

BPCL, however brought in the experienced Sabu Varkey and Hari Prasad to man the midfield.

The two shut out the Central Railway attacks as BPCL once again started to dominate the match.

BPCL's Rama then put them into the lead with a rasping shot from top of the 'D' and then Devendra deflected in a free hit in the dying moments of the game, to make the issue safe as BPCL quelled the challenge from Central Railway 4-2 and thus made into the semifinal grade from Pool 'A'.

In the other match, Hyderabad XI dominated with Ramaswamy giving the Hyderabadis the lead against Tamil Nadu XI converting a penalty stroke in the 15th minute.

Goals from Arvind and L Ramesh in the 23rd and 32nd minute made the issue safe for Hyderabad XI with Tamil Nadu XI getting a consolation goal in the 64th minute through Vinod Rayer reducing the margin.

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