The Hindu : Sport / Volleyball : Uttaranchal shocks Railways

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Wednesday, Jan 18, 2006

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Sport - Volleyball

Uttaranchal shocks Railways

M.C. Raman

Pune: Uttaranchal lifted its game to shock former champion Railways 25-27, 25-20, 25-22, 25-14 in men's Group Y of the 54th National senior volleyball championship at the Sri Chhatrapathi indoor complex, Balawadi, here on Tuesday.

Uttaranchal's win has now forced Railways to battle it out with Kerala for a slot in the knock-out semifinal.

In the same group Kerala lost its touch in defence for a brief period against Karnataka. But it bounced back to win its first match in two encounters at 25-21, 23-25, 25-13, 32-30. It was some redemption for Kerala which had lost badly to Uttaranchal late on Monday night at 23-25, 25-21, 21-25, 26-28.

In a Group X match Punjab scored its second win shocking holder Haryana 25-21, 25-23, 25-23.

Inspired squad

Uttaranchal looked a highly inspired squad on Monday night and again on Tuesday. Uttaranchal's approach was positive and its block was superb against Railways. It took some time for the former champion to realize that something was seriously wrong.

But by the time Uttaranchal was right on top, dictating terms.

Railways had a great escape even in the first set when it was tied at 25-all but managed to win at 27-25.

But from the second set onwards Uttaranchal did not allow a single spike to go unchallenged. Srikanth, Suddarshan Verma and Ashok were blocked out. It was strange that Railways' coach Karimulla did not use Sivarajan, a consistent spiker. He also did not bring in setter Ravikanth Reddy for Kapil Dev when things were going badly for Railways.

In the second and third sets Uttaranchal surged to two or three-point leads and in the fourth set it blocked out the Railway team completely.

Kerala in control

Kerala put behind its bad loss to Uttaranchal and played better against Karnataka. Only for a brief period did its defence falter. Otherwise the team was in full control. Tom Joseph angled his shots well while setter Anil took control and steered the team safely. He also brought in the second line attack well by feeding the ball to Sayooj and Shamji Thomas.

Blocker Rajeev was a bit slow but Azeez made up in block as well as in attack. Vikram, Premjith and Lakshminaryan tried to beat the rival block, but Karnataka did badly in retrieving the block rebounds. With its second loss, Karnataka is now virtually out of the race.

On Monday night Andhra and Karnataka women met in a crucial match for the semifinal berth in Group Y. And after a prolonged tussle Andhra won the battle that had more shouting and swearing in it.

Similarly, Bengal managed to wrap up its match against Tamil Nadu.

The results:

Men: Gr. Y: Uttaranchal beat Kerala 25-23, 21-25, 25-21, 28-26; Uttaranchal beat Railways 25-27, 25-20, 25-22, 25-14; Kerala beat Karnataka 25-21, 23-25, 25-13, 32-30.

Women: Gr. X: Kerala beat Chandigarh 25-10, 25-20, 25-19; Bengal beat Tamil Nadu 23-25, 25-15, 25-19, 25-21. Gr. Y: Andhra beat Karnataka 19-25, 25-14, 20-25, 28-26, 16-14; Railways beat Karnataka 25-18, 25-8, 25-8.

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