BPCL (Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited), Bangalore began the defence of their title with a convincing 5-1 victory against an uncharacteristic Army XI, Delhi in a Pool-A match of the Dabang Mumbai – 50th All India Bombay Gold Cup hockey tournament, at the MHAL-Mahindra Stadium on Thursday afternoon. Union Bank of India and Bank of India are the co-sponsors of the tournament.
BPCL’s Tushar Khandekar is all set to have a crack at the Army XI goal during a Pool-A league match of MHAL
Later in the evening, last year’s runners-up Indian Oil, Bangalore, also boasting of several Indian players Dharamvir Singh, Khotajit Singh and Raghunath V.R. and a couple of former internationals in their ranks ran roughshod against South Central Railway, Secundrabad romping to a 7-1 victory.
Once again Dharamvir led the Indian Oil charge with another hat-trick, his second in the tournament. Skipper Deepak Thakur scored two while Raghunath and Gurjinder Singh scored one each from penalty corners.
The BPCL outfit with current Indian players S.V. Sunil, Birendra Lakra, Manpreet Singh and Mohd Amir Khan along with former stars Tushar Khandekar, William Xalco and Ravi Pal enjoyed total domination and did not take too long to open the scoring with Gurpreet Singh scoring from the first penalty corner in the third minute. Later Mohd Amir Khan from a field effort doubled the lead in the 20th minute as BPCL went into the break leading 2-0.
After changing ends, BPCL continued to hold sway and nine minutes after the restart, Sunil cut in deep from the right before playing the ball across for Somanna Pradhan who in flash swept the ball home past goalkeeper Akash. Two minutes later, Sunil capped a fine solo effort to score the fourth goal.
Army managed to get a goal back when Robin converted from their 4th penalty corner in the 54th minute, but BPCL added one more to their tally with Pradhan netting his second goal with a diving effort in the 68th minute.
BPCL and Central Railway, the third team in the pool are now assured of a place in Sunday’s quarter-final. Central had earlier defeated the Army 4-2 and take on BPCL on Saturday.
Results – Pool-A: BPCL 5 (Gurpreet Singh 3rd, Mohd Amir Khan 20th, Somanna Pradhan 44th, 68th, S.V. Sunil 46th) beat Army XI 1 (Robin 54th).
Pool-D: Indian Oil (Deepak Thakur 1st, 8th, Dharamvir Singh 3rd, 57th, 61st, Raghunath V.R. 13th, Gurjinder Singh 66th) beat South Central Railway (Rajupal 13th).