ISLAMABAD, Dec 19: Defending champions Army and title- contenders Police scored contrasting victories at the start of the 39th Prime Minister’s National Volleyball Championship on Friday at the Liaquat Gymnasium.

Army quickly made their intentions clear with a 3-0 blanking of Higher Education Commission in a Group A match played in the morning while Police, in Group B, had to put up quite a fight against a gallant PAF, in what was officially the “opening” game.

Police carved out a 25-19, 23-25, 25-14, 25-14 in an engrossing match watched by a small but noisy crowd. Army on the other hand had an easy game and walked off 25-8, 25-14, 25-20 winners.

In other matches, POF defeated Punjab 25-15, 25-18, 25-19 in the first match of the day, Navy beat PTCL 25-10, 25-18, 25-16 and home side Islamabad achieved a 20-25, 25-20, 25-22, 25-22 victory to complete the first session of matches.

Police, winners of the national crown for a record 15 times, were surprised by the tenacity of the PAF players who pulled level at 7-7 after having fallen behind in the opening game. In a well-contested affair, the two sides stood level two more times, at 8-8 and 9-9, before Police raced ahead to take the game.

With a host of big names among their ranks including Ehsanullah Tipu and Mazhar, Police were helped by some good work done by libro Tariq who did his job well, as did other players on the team.

PAF bounced bank in the second game which saw them take lead after being level at 2-2. But Police came from behind to draw equal at 15-15 before the Airforce players, prominent among them Khalid Jadoon, Saeed Akhtar and Riaz Khan, propelled their side to victory.

With the match score standing 1-1, the third game witnessed a lot of fireworks and the sides were level at least four times, the last being at 11-11 following which Police slowly but surely surged ahead to make the score 2-1.

Although PAF continued to fight hard, it was not to be their day as Police kept collecting important points to seal victory. Their opponents on Saturday now will be Islamabad.

Army’s victory over Higher Education was the result of some fine play by Sakhi Muhammad and Zafar Iqbal who played their part to perfection. Also doing well were Jameel and Naeemullah who made sure their side made a good start to the championship.

Results:

Fixtures: Army v Sindh, Police v Islamabad, Wapda v PTCL, POF v Railways, NWFP v HEC, PAF v AJK, Navy v Pak Board, Punjab v Balochistan.