NBP 5 .. Sindh ‘B’ 1

Sindh ‘A’ 4 ... Railways 2

KARACHI, Jan 30: National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) routed Sindh ‘B’ 5-1 to almost guarantee Punjab ‘A’ a place in the quarterfinals of the Junior Under-18 National Hockey Championship at the Hockey Club of Pakistan Wednesday.

Punjab `B’, who are tied with Sindh `B’ at four points, play their last league match against the bankers Thursday. Even if Punjab ‘A’ lose, they will reach the knockout as they have a plus eight-goal advantage over Sindh `B’.

Mathematically, Sindh’s can only pray for National Bank’s victory over Punjab by a difference of nine goals which will put them in the next round. However, the prospects look slim.

In the other match of the day, Sindh `A’ came back from one goal down to beat Railways 4-2, a victory dominated by their goalkeeper Qurban Ali who excelled under the bar and saved no less than four certain goals.

Sindh ‘A’ finished on top of Pool C and will play either defending champions PTCL or Police who will lock horns in the last league match on Thursday. The winner of PTCL-Police match will play Railways in the second quarter-final scheduled for Friday.

After National Bank sat pretty at halftime by leading 2-0 through Javed Iqbal (27) and Mohammad Kashif Ikram (35), Sindh ‘B’ staged a spirited fightback when they pulled one back through Azlan Khan who scored a beauty with a reverse flick in the 42nd minute.

As Sindh ‘B’ mounted pressure and looked like drawing level at any time, they were denied a penalty stroke by umpire Haider Rasool who instead awarded a penalty corner.

A couple of minutes later, the same umpire continued play after Abbas Haider’s stick was checked from behind by National Bank defender when he only had the goalkeeper in front.

The bankers fully capitalized from these two lucky breaks that could have changed the complexion of the match had Sindh got the equalizer. They then pumped in three goals in seven minutes to seal the fate of the match.

Javed Iqbal scored his second goal of the match in the 54th minute and two minutes later Kashif got his second to put the bankers 4-1 ahead. Penalty corner specialist Imran Ali Warsi completed the tally when his forceful push went into the top of the cage from the fifth penalty corner.

In an another exciting match, Railways took a 30-minute lead through Nadeem Junior that suddenly brought life in the game. Prior to that, there was only one significant move when Railways attacked Sindh goal only to be thwarted by an alert Qurban Ali.

Sindh ‘A’ got two excellent opportunities to draw level in the last five minutes of the first half but once Samiullah’s shot was deflected wide and later Alley Hasan’s inch-perfect cross was wasted.

In the 41st minute, Shabbir A.Khan scored undoubtedly the goal of the tournament after a superb inter-change with Mudassir Abbas from a move initiated by Samiullah from the centre. Sindh then went 3-1 ahead in the 51st minute when Rizwan Khan sounded the board after Shabbir’s hit from top of the D had rebounded from the goalpost.

Six minutes later, M.Imran Khan dodged past three defenders to slip the ball into the net between goalkeeper’s pads to put his team 4-1 ahead.

Enjoying a comfortable cushion, Sindh boys relaxed and paid the price when Rizwan Asif wrong-footed Qurban Ali to reduce the margin in the 61st minute.

Railways then launched a series of attacks but failed to beat a stubborn Qurban who must have got a timely wake-up call.

Thursday’s fixture: PTCL v Police at 1.45pm, NBP v Punjab ‘A’ at 3.15pm.

Points table

Tabulated under played, won, lost, drawn, goals for, goals against and points.

GROUP A

PTCL 2 2 0 0 12 1 6

Police 2 2 0 0 8 0 6

NWFP ‘A’ 3 1 2 0 5 11 3

Punjab ‘B’ 3 0 3 0 1 14 0

GROUP B

Army 2 2 0 0 8 1 6

PEB 2 1 1 0 2 4 3

Islamabad 2 0 2 0 0 5 0

GROUP C

Sindh ‘A’ 3 3 0 0 14 4 9

Railways 3 2 1 0 6 4 6

NWFP ‘B’ 3 1 2 0 3 8 3

Balochistan ‘B’ 3 0 3 0 0 7 0

GROUP D

NBP 2 2 0 0 10 1 6

Punjab ‘A’ 2 1 0 1 7 2 4

Sindh ‘B’ 3 1 1 1 7 10 4

Balochistan ‘A’ 3 0 3 0 3 14 0