The Hindu : Sport / Hockey : Dhillon's `golden goal' takes Punjab Police into semifinals

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Nov 23, 2004

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Sport - Hockey

Dhillon's `golden goal' takes Punjab Police into semifinals

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, NOV. 22. Baljit Dhillon's `golden goal' took Punjab Police past Namdhari XI into the semifinals of the Nehru hockey tournament at the Shivaji Stadium here on Monday.

The regulation period had ended in a 2-2 draw, with Punjab Police getting the equaliser through Gagan Ajit Singh, about nine minutes from the end.

Bharat Petroleum prevailed over Air India by a late second-half goal, by Len Aiyappa, in another quarterfinal match.

Namdhari XI gave the jitters to the defending champion. It put up a stout-hearted defence, starving Gagan Ajit of passes, and then counter-attacked with vigour. A fifth-minute goal by Anmolak Singh, off a fine pass from Didar Singh, had set the tempo for Namdhari XI. And just after the hooter sounded for the break, Gurcharan Singh struck, off a penalty corner, to put the Namdharis ahead at 2-1.

Baljit Dhillon had earlier converted a penalty corner to equalise for Punjab Police, but his overall success rate did cause a worry for his team, forcing a brief induction of Jugraj Singh late in the match. Dhillon, however, clinched the winner off the 10th penalty corner for the `golden goal' in the seventh minute of extra time to make up for the misses. Dhillon took all but one of the penalty corners, but it must be admitted that several of them came in sequences, like it did for the `golden goal', the eighth leading to the ninth and eventually the goal-bearing one.

Gagan's equaliser was a splendid effort, though for once he was given room by the defence. It came following a pass from Gabbar Singh that rolled to the Olympian off a defender's stick. For a precious second, the defence stood confused as Gagan veered towards his left, drawing the goalkeeper out of his charge and then found the boards with his patented reverse hit.

The match generated considerable heat, off the playing pitch, with the two `benches' getting into a row, attracting a section of the crowd as well, during the second half. But tempers were brought under control. Yet, after the match, tempers frayed again, though nothing untoward happened.

The second match of the afternoon was compensation enough for the first in which BPCL and Air India played a drab game. That just one penalty corner accrued in the whole match should tell the tale. And that one was drag-flicked home by Aiyappa in the 56th minute to clinch what turned out to be the winning goal.

BPCL had a couple of misses late in the match, the most glaring being those by Amar Aiyamma and Deepak Sharma.

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