Ishlauddin does the star turn for Railways

By Avinash Nair

BANGALORE, JAN. 6. Mohd. Ishlauddin did the star turn for Indian Railways as it got past the defence of Services for a 89-77 verdict. In the meanwhile S. Robinson of Tamil Nadu failed adding to its woes. The holder caved in to Rajasthan's pluck at 54-76 on the second day of the 51st Senior National basketball championship at the Sree Kanteerava stadium here on Saturday evening.

Tamil Nadu threw in the towel quite early. On this day there was nothing that the talented youngsters marshalled by a balding Gopinath could do right. The attempts were hasty and often came off the ring while the defence, despite the presence of three tall men, was pathetic to say the least. Things came to such a pass that Mangi Lal, standing at not more than five and half feet tall, managed to collect offensive rebounds from under Shabeer Ahmed and Robinson's noses.

The coach brought in Swaminathan early on who also failed to impress. Gopinath for his part weaved his way into the rival area and at times even managed to get his long rangers in. But more often than not the ball bounced off the ring with none to pick the rebounds. Moses Jeevanathan though patchy was persisted with only because Sridhar nor Sivashankar were on target.

Rajasthan on the other hand had its wingers - Virender Joshi and Mangi Lal - in good nick. They made a mockery of the TN defence with repeated forays down the flanks. And with Ashok Kumar also chipping in effectively with his three-pointers, as did Pankaj Malik in the dying minutes, Rajasthan won comfortably.

TN did manage to take the lead at 27-26 after going into the second quarter at 17-21. But that was the only time it looked better than its rival.

With both Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu with one win in two matches, Karnataka for now enjoys the top position in Group `A' having brushed aside Madhya Pradesh's challenge at 72-46 after leading 38-20 at the change of ends. This was Karnataka's second straight win. Murli Mohan was once again the main contributor tallying 24 points.

Md. Ishlauddin, the beanpole who switched loyalties from Bihar to Railways this year, was the star attraction of the day. The gangling player with flaying arms, which were not used effectively in the initial stages, proved his worth in a telling manner. Ishlauddin kept the Services shooter Phool Singh in check with a fine display under the defensive board. He also ventured upfront to use his height to good advantage, converting pivotal shots as well as gaining foul advantage.

For Services playmakers Sambaji Kadam and Sharad Nagne were unimpressive. Phool Singh and G.R.L. Prasad did get their shots in with Prasad making capital use of free-throws.

For Railways, apart from Ishlauddin, Ravi Kumar and Ranjith seized on the chance and dished out a superb all-round game allowing coach Ajmer Singh, an Arjuna Awardee, to rest veteran shooters Ram Kumar and D. Babu. Babu when introduced later did appreciably well.

On the distaff side Karnataka led by international Reshma Punith and captain Savitha and India junior captain Rajalakshmi mauled Rajasthan 80-28 for its second big win.

The confident Tamil Nadu team began on a winning note beating Uttar Pradesh 49-29 in late night action on Friday.

The results:

Men: Group A: Rajasthan 76 (Virender Joshi 30, Mangi Lal 16, Pankaj Malik 11) bt Tamil Nadu 54 (Moses Jeevanathan 16, Robinson 11, Gopinath 10) (ht: 37-33); Karnataka 66 (Murli Mohan 24, Sachindra 18, Rajkumar 11) bt Madhya Pradesh 46 (Sukand Garg 25, Srinivas Iyer 10) (ht: 38-20).

Group B: Bihar 66 (Jaldeep Dahiwal 11, Deshraj 23, N.S. Rawat 13) bt Uttar Pradesh 36 (Suresh Kumar 18, Tridip 13) (ht: 38-17); Railways 89 (Md Ishlauddin 26, Ranjith 12, Ashok 10) bt Services 77 (Phool Singh 16, Sweeto Francis 10, Dalip Kumar 10) (ht: 43- 33).

Group C: Goa 66 (Atmaram Desai 35, Sandeep Warlikar 18) bt Pondicherry 63 (Dhanasu 15, Sundar Vadivelu 12) (ht: 35-33); West Bengal 79 (Amalendu Singh 23, Nagendra Tiwari 13) bt Pondicherry 58 (Dhanasu 24) (ht: 42-33); Haryana 65 (Praveen Kumar 28, Manoj Kumar 16) bt Gujarat 63 (Johnson Abraham 18, Jadeja 10) (ht: 27- 33).

Group D: Chandigarh 81 (Ambarish 24, Neeraj 18) bt HP 61 (Varinder Kumar 18, Sunny 11) (ht: 39-28); Maharashtra 74 (Harpreet Singh 24, Srihari 10) bt Orissa 53 (A. Patra 15, Priyaranjan 10) (ht: 50-29).

Group E: Delhi 55 (Ashfaq 12, Dalbir Singh 11) bt J&K 21 (Sudesh Kumar 8) (ht: 43-9); Kerala 79 (Viju Chacko 9, Santosh John 8) bt Assam 24 (Rajiv Bora 8) (ht: 33-8).

Women: Group A: Kerala 68 (Ambily Thomas 23, Jiji George 13) bt Punjab 55 (Saranjit 19, Manjet Brar 19) (ht: 44-28); Railways 56 (Sheba Magnon 12, Ivy Cherian 12, B.S. Shyla 10) bt Punjab 19 (Saranjit 10) (ht: 35-15); Kerala 74 (Lajitha 22) bt Maharashtra 57 (Mitali Gurjar 14, Lincy Joseph 57) (ht: 36-26).

Group B: Tamil Nadu 48 (Vidya Sridharan 13, P. Anitha 14) bt UP 29 (T.L. Sindoo 10) (ht: 28-13).

Group C: West Bengal 57 (Rekha Choudhary 13, Rumi Barua 8) bt J&K 12 (Monica Sharma 9) (ht: 30-10); Andhra Pradesh 64 (Sofi San 13, Sisily 16) bt HP 27 (Bhavana 9) (ht: 37- 10).

Group D: Chandigarh 55 (Savitha 13, Ranjitha 10) bt Haryana 16 (ht: 28-8).

Group E: Orissa 48 (Srilatha 22, Pragnya 9) bt Gujarat 30 (Namratha 13, Persis 9) (ht: 23-21); Pondicherry 32 (J. Lee 9, E. Sarasu 7) bt Goa 17 (Mabel 8) (ht: 22-6).

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