Sport - Hockey   

ASC in semifinals

CHENNAI NOV. 23. ASC (Bangalore) rode on K.M. Bopanna's shoulders to score a 4-2 victory over last year's runner-up Christu Raja (Tirunelveli) in the semifinals of the St. Paul's Cup fifth South Zone inter-school hockey tournament at the SDAT-Mayor Radhakrishnan Stadium here on Sunday.

In the final on Monday, ASC takes on CSI-St. Paul's (Chennai), which edged out Railway HSS (Palakkad) 1-0. For Paul's, Jayakumar scored the winner off Allen Rajesh's pass.

ASC, a former champion, displayed impressive co-ordination, more so in the second half. Bopanna, speedy and wristy, had a hand in all four goals - first feeding P. Karthikeyan who put the side up in the 23rd minute and later accounting for the remaining three strikes.

But it was the Tirunelveli side, which showed the initiative early on. It earned six penalty corners to ASC's three, and two penalty strokes to boot. But ASC's alert goalkeeper Manivannan successfully foiled the strokes taken by Philip Martin and Anbu Kannan in the 12th and 36th minutes respectively.

Christu Raja's Sathia Jothi and Martin came up with some good moves upfront, but the ASC defence thwarted them with sound tackles.

ASC's Subbiah was an asset on the right. It was his pass that set off Bopanna on a solo in the 33rd minute, which he converted with élan.

Christu Raja levelled through Vinod Rayer and Sathia Jothi in the 37th and 40th minutes, but Bopanna gave the lead two minutes later off a Subbiah pass from the right. He sealed the issue with a penalty corner conversion in the 54th minute.

Other results (league): Railway (Palakkad) 3 (Rajesh Kumar 2, Md. Hakim) bt Shankar (Salem) 0; ASC 5 (C.J. Rajesh 2, M.D. Dhiran, Manikandan, K.M. Bopanna) bt Kumara Raja (Chennai) 0.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Sport

News: Front Page | National | Southern States | Other States | International | Opinion | Business | Sport | Miscellaneous |
Advts: Classifieds | Employment | Obituary |

Stories in this Section

Cricket

• Lower order rescues Sri Lanka `A'
• Kapil comes to Kale's defence
• Kale affair: Subba Rao to issue notices today
• Vermeulen helps Zimbabwe level series
• Rain has the final say again
  
  Tennis
  
• Qureshi does it again
• Harsh is India's best bet
  
  Hockey
  
• Punjab Police, BPCL in semifinals
• ASC in semifinals
  
  Billiards & Snooker
  
• Lagan crowned World champion
  
  Chess
  
• Shantharam in sole lead
  
  Racing : Motor
  
• Chinnappa steals the show
  
  Table Tennis
  
• Poulami wins fourth title of season
  
  

Copyright © 2003, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu