Army hold defending champs NBP in National Hockey

KARACHI: A couple of interesting and hot contesting matches were witnessed in the 65th Air Marshall (late) Nur Khan Hockey Championship, when Pakistan Army (Colour) played a draw match against defending champions NBP 1-1 and SSGC crushed PIA by 3-2 at Abdul Sattar Edhi hockey stadium on Tuesday.

On the day eight of the championship four more matches played and four teams qualified for the quarterfinals. In the pool “A” Pakistan Army (Color) got first position due to better goal average with 10 points, while defending champions NBP were placed second in the same pool with 10 points.

In pool “C” SSGC got first position with 12 points while PIA were placed second with 9 points.In the first match of the day NBP’s Arslan Qadir scored first goal on penalty corner. However soon after Pakistan Army (Colour) made a move and Arsalan Iqbal successful netted a field goal to equalise the match 1-1. There was no further scoring though both the sides made all efforts for a decider.

Three quarters proved goalless despite hard efforts of both teams to score the goal but the defenders of both teams were alert and punctured the moves of the attackers.

In the second match Wapda easily thumped Army (W) by 6-0. Forward Aleem Usman opened the account. M. Imran and Usman played well throughout in the not only making moves but also netted two goals each. Aleem Bilal and Tasawar Abbas scored one goal each.

In the third match Wapda(W) trounced Pakistan Railway by 5-1. However, Railway’s Zaheer Hussain and Owaisur Rehman played well. Zahidullah and Suleman netted two goals each for Wapda.

In the fourth match SSGC defeated PIA 3-2. SSGC put PIA under pressure most of the time. M. Hamza Waheed, Rana Sohail, and Mubashir Ali netted one goal each for the wining team.Despite this defeat PIA were successful in reaching quarterfinals of the championship.

The quart finals of the National Hockey Championship will be played from August 1 while semifinals would be on August 3 and final on August 4.