Army, Diamond Paintsmarch ahead in Spring Polo

LAHORE: Army Whites and Diamond Paints Blues carved out contrasting victories in the Spring Polo Cup 2018 matches played here at the Lahore Polo Club (LPC) ground on Wednesday.

In the first match of the day, Army Whites outpaced Army Reds by 6-3½. For Army Whites, Ignasio Negri was star of the day as he hammered a hat-trick while Brig Zulfiqar Ali Baig, Major Omer Minhas and Major Haseeb Minhas contributed one goal each. From the losing side, which had two and half goal handicap advantage, Mighuel Luis Duggan scored the only goal. Brig Zulfiqar scored the opening goal to give Army Whites 1-0 lead which was soon leveled 1-1 by Army Reds when Miguel Luis Duggan struck a field goal. The second chukker Whites adding one more through Ignasio to make it 2-1 and Maj Haseeb struck one more for Whites in the third chukker to further enhance the lead to 3-1. Whites played aggressive polo in the fourth chukker thwarted three goals to finish the match having 6-1 lead. With 2 and half goal handicap, the final score was 6-3½ in favour of Whites. Hamza Mawaz Khan and Mumtaz Abbas Niazi officiated the match as field umpires while Raja Arslan Najeeb was referee. The second encounter of the day proved to be a thriller, where Macos Araya came from behind to guide Master Paints Blues to a well-deserving 6-5 victory over Diamond Paints Black. Macos Araya was hero of the day for Diamond Paints Blues as he struck superb three goals while Ahmed Zubair Butt scored a brace and Bilal Haye hit one. From the losing side, Eulogio Celestino hammered a quartet while Abdul Rehman Monnoo scored one goal. Eulogio Celestino converted first goal for Diamond Paints Black to take 1-0 lead which was further enhanced to 2-0 by Abdul Rehman Monnoo. The second chukker was dominated by Diamond Paints Blues, who struck two through Ahmed Zubair and Bilal Haye to level the score 2-2. The third chukker was evenly poised as two goals each were scored by both the teams to make it 4-4. Eulogio struck a brace for Black and Macos and Ahmed Zubair hit one goal each for Blues.

In the fourth and last chukker, Black took 5-4 lead through Eulogio but Macos Araya came from behind to score back-to-back goals to steer Blues 6-5 victory. Saqib Khan Khakwani and Hissam Ali Hyder supervised the match as field umpires while Juan Cruz Losada acted as match referee. Today (Thursday), two matches will be played as Rizvi’s/Master Paints will take on Newage/Guard Group at 2:00 pm in the first encounter while Barry’s will vie against Master Paints Black in the second fixture to be played at 3:00 pm here at the Lahore Polo Club ground. Earlier on the opening day, matches of the Spring Cup were washed out and will be played later. Rizvi’s/Master Paints had to face Newage/Guard Group in the first match and Barry’s had to play against Master Paints Black later on the day but these matches would now be played later, said Lahore Polo Club secretary Col (r) Shoaib Aftab. He said although the sunshine was good yet the ground remained wet, which forced the management to postpone the matches. “We have also considered the safety of the players, that’s why the matches were postponed and will be adjusted played later during the tournament.”