Central Secretariat score impressive win over Navy

MUMBAI: Central Secretariat, Delhi produced a slick impressive performance and scored an authoritative 5-1 victory against an uncharacteristic Indian Navy in a Group-B league match of the 14th PMC Bank-All India Guru Tegh Bahadur Gold Cup hockey tournament and played at the MHAL-Mahindra Stadium, Churchgate on Wednesday. Leading Central Secretariat charge was ace sharpshooter Ikhidar Ishrat who opened and closed the scoring (17th and 68th minutes). In between, Muthanna Boverianda (35th minute), Pankaj Singh (45th minute) and Felix Baa (58th minute) chipped in with one goal each to complete the victory. Navy who played second fiddle managed to pull one back through Pawan Rajbhar's goal in the (24th minute). This was Central Secretariat's second straight win while Indian Navy sunk to their first defeat in three games.

Earlier, in another match of the same group, last year's joint winners, South Central Railway, Secundrabad returned on the winning track as they rallied to down Hockey Bhopal 5-3. The Bhopal outfit scored twice through Vikas Choudhry in the final five minutes of the second half to open up a 2-0 lead. But, the Secundrabad side cut the deficit when Lovepreet Singh scored a field goal in the 35th minute. South Central came back stronger in the second period and completely dominated play as they scored four goals to knock the fight out of their opponents. Innocent Kullu struck a brace of goals (44th and 53rd minutes), while Sandeep Kumar Singh (51st minute) and Mayank James (64th minute) got the other two goals. This was the first win for the Secundrabad team who had lost to Navy in their opening match.