The Hindu : Sport / Basketball : YMCA all-India tournament

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Wednesday, Feb 20, 2008
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Sport - Basketball

YMCA all-India tournament

Principal Correspondent

KOTTAYAM: Defending men’s champion MEG from Bangalore, runner-Indian Bank (Chennai) and Kochi’s Central Excise, a former Federation Cup champion, are some of top teams in the 14th YMCA all-India basketball tournament beginning at the Nehru Stadium floodlit court here on Wednesday evening.

Six men’s teams, placed in two groups, and four women’s sides will be seen in action in the five-day tournament, organised by the Kottayam YMCA.

KSEB confusion

The fixtures had Kerala State Electricity Board as one of the teams on the opening day’s action but a board official said that the KSEB men’s and women’s teams would not be playing in the tournament.

And for a strange reason too. “The Budget session of the State Assembly begins tomorrow (Wednesday) and since our players work in the PRO’s office and in the Board Secretariat, their services are needed to prepare answers for questions that may be put up during the Assembly session," said the official from Thiruvananthapuram.

"And since this is not an obligatory tournament, we have been told not to send our players to Kottayam," he said. "We have told the organisers well in advance about this."

Assurance

A little later, Kottayam MLA V.N. Vasavan, the tournament’s patron who will also do the opening honours on Wednesday evening, said that he had spoken to State Electricity Minister A.K. Balan and he had given an assurance that the KSEB teams would play in the event.

The top two men’s teams from each group will enter the semifinals while the women’s tournament will be a league affair.

The groupings:

Men: Group A: MEG (Bangalore), Central Excise (Kochi), KSEB (Thiruvananthapuram);