The Hindu : Sport : TN swamps Madhya Bharath

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jun 19, 2007
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Sport

Sport

TN swamps Madhya Bharath

Sports Reporter

PHOTO: M. VEDHAN

GOALMOUTH ACTION: Vinod Rayer, who starred for TN, scoopes one over the Madhya Bharath custodian Surya Prakash.

CHENNAI: Tamil Nadu couldn’t have hoped for a better start in its opening match in the St. Joseph’s-TNHA junior men’s National hockey championship, beating Madhya Bharath 18-0 at the Mayor Radhakrishnan Stadim here on Monday.

Despite the one-sidedness of the match, it has to be conceded that some loose ends need to be tightened up by the host.

Vinod Rayer, a Tiruchi-born player now with SAI (Chennai) was easily the star as he pumped in six goals.

Skipper Shyam Kumar joined in the goal-fest finding the target four times.

It was TN all the way from the first whistle and throughout the first half — it led 8-0 — Madhya Bharath was not able to get past the half-line.

The visitor was content defending. Shyam opened the floodgates in the fifth minute. After Vinod’s effective backhander which was the second goal, the host turned out to be relentless in its pursuit of goals. Now the sore point — out of 11 penalty corners, Tamil Nadu could convert only three.

The results: Pool E: Air India 14 (Danish Mujtaba 5, Vinod Kumar, Ashish Minz 2, Md. Imran, Pramod Dhir, Mayank James 2, Innocent Kullu 2) bt Chattisgarh 0; Namdhari 4 (Baljinder Singh 2, Gurwinder Singh, Karamjit Singh) bt Delhi 1 (Ravinder); Po ol A: Vidarbha 12 (Imran Khan, Nilesh Bendre, Amir Khan 4, Rakesh Kamble, Ananta Yerawar, Thurmirza 4) bt Guj 3 (Bhagiroth Singh 2, Vijay Thapa); TN 18 (Vinod Rayer 6, Shyam Kumar 4, Hari Krishnan 2, Laxman Karan, Vivek, Raja 2, Heartlin James 2) bt Madhya Bharath 0; Bihar 13 (Bincey Behengra 6, Bhim Kumar 4 (hat-trick), Anup Tokno, Devanand, Mukesh Lakra) bt Guj 1 (Vijay Thapa); Pool C: Har 3 (Ved Prakash 2, Sandeep Kumar) bt MP 2 (Gunendra, Irshad Khan); Mizoram 7 (Naltanzbna 2 , Lalbuhawma, Dawnglama, Lalringheta 2, Lalngamhawma) bt Mah 0; Pool G: IOC 2 (Harbeer Singh, Jagwant) bt UP 0.