Ace forward Ruqqaiya Shaikh was in impressive scoring form and notched up a fine hat-trick which was feature of Freunds Red’s easy 4-1 win against Freunds Blue in a Women’s semi-final match of the Willingdon Catholic Gymkhana 37th Victor D’Mello Memorial Trophy Rink Hockey Tournament – 2018, conducted under the auspices of the MHAL, and played at the Gymkhana’s floodlit tennis courts.
Ruqqaiya Shaikh scored a hat-trick to take Freunds Red into the Women’s final of the Willingdon Catholic Gymkhana Rink Hockey Tournament .
In an evenly contested match, Ruqqaiya exhibited brilliant finishing skills and scored midway through the opening period to give Freunds Red a slender 1-0 half-time advantage. After switching ends, she was again on target scoring the second goal before Madhavi Patil netted the third goal to put Reds in a commanding position. Freunds Blue fought on gamely and managed to pull one goal back through Sharmin Bassha, but Ruqqaiya put the issue beyond doubt by scoring for the third time to complete her hat-trick and seal the team’s win and a place in the final.
In the second semi-final encounter, Central Railway took off on the right track and after enjoying a 2-0 half-time lead went on to record an 3-1 victory against Hockey Lovers SC to advance to the final. The Railway outfit rode on the double strikes from their skipper Kavita Vidyarthi and one from the stick of R. Ramngaihzuali to complete the scoring tally, while Kelly John scored the lone goal for the losing side.
Women’s Semi-finals: Freunds Red 4 (Ruqqaiya Shaikh 3, Madhavi Patil) beat Freunds Blue 1 (Sharmin Bassha).
Central Railway 3 (Kavita Vidyarthi 2, R. Ramngaihzuali) beat Hockey Lovers 1 (Kelly John).
Veterans semi-finals: Rebels SC 5 (Solomon Alexander 4, Meghraj S.) beat Ave Maria 3 (John Fernandes, Nirel Pimenta, Nasir Khondkar).