January 28, 2002	Monday	Ziqa’ad 13, 1422

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LAHORE, Jan 27: Okara shattered Lahore’s dreams of completing a hat trick of titles when they beat them 8-5 on penalty strokes to set up a final showdown with last year’s runners-up Toba Tek Singh who outplayed Sheikhupura 3-0 in the third Punjab Under-16 inter-district hockey championship at the National Hockey Stadium Sunday.

The nerve-wrecking thriller went into a shootout after both the teams were locked at 3-all after stipulated 70 minutes of play.

Okara will face last year’s losing finalists Toba Tek Singh in the title match Monday. Toba Tek Singh rode on Inayatullah’s back while defeating Sheikhupura 3-0.

Inayatullah found the cage in the 20th and 52nd minute while Asim Shafiq sounded the board in the 33rd minute.

In the shootout, Okara goalkeeper Shahid Iqbal made all the difference when he stopped three and conceded two against Lahore’s Mureed Abbas who badly failed to intercept all the pushes from the Mohammad Sajjad, Abdul Qadir, Ghulam Abbas, Iftikhar and Zubair.

In the regulation period, Okara led the half-time at 1-0 with the lone goal of the session coming from Mohammad Sajjad in the ninth minute.

Second minute into the second session, Okara doubled the lead through Zubair to sit pretty at 2-0. However, Lahore staged a magnificent fightback when Asim Faheem (43rd minute) and Shehzad Ali banged home goals in a space of four minutes to draw level.

However, Lahore celebrations were short-lived when two minutes later Okara were back in lead when Sajjad scored his second goal. Nevertheless, Mohammad Fayyaz restored parity when he converted the fifth penalty corner in the very next minute.