Maharashtra knocked out, Punjab thrash Bihar in junior hockey nationals

Pune, Dec 19 (IANS) Jharkhand knocked out Maharashtra from the men's junior national hockey tournament beating them 2-1 in the quarterfinals at the Balewadi Sports Complex astro-turf here Monday.

Maharashtra took the lead in the 24th minute through Harjeet Singh and held onto their 1-0 lead till half-time. But after resumption they paid the price, thanks to some selfish play. Jharkhand, on the other hand put up an inspired performance as they hung on in the match and finally scored the equaliser in the 47th minute, courtesy Anil Xaxa.

Maharashtra couldn't take advantage of some fine stick play and squandered eight penalty corners in the match. Thanks to some determined defending from Jharkhand the match went into extra time.

Five minutes into extra time, Rajin Kandulna of Jharkhand gave his team the lead after collecting a long pass on the right wing and struck a stinging running shot that cannoned into the top corner to send the Jharkend team into the semi-finals.

Jharkand will now face Haryana in the semi-final after the latter beat Madhya Pradesh Hockey Academy in the last quarterfinal of the day by 5-3.

Elsewhere, Punjab demolished Bihar 6-1 to fix a meeting with Orissa in the first semi-finals, who hardly broke sweat in their game against Karnataka, thrashing them 5-2.

Results (Quarterfinals):

Punjab 6 (Sukhmanjit Singh 19th, 48th, Ajit Pandit 24th, Jatinder Singh 34th, Mandeep Singh 41st, Simranjit Singh 56th) beat Bihar 1 (Noel Dodray 62nd).

Jharkhand 2 (Anil Xaxa 47th, Rajin Kandulna 75th) beat Maharashtra 1 (Harjeet Singh 24th).

Orissa 5 (Deepak Kullu 5th, Sushil Xalxo 18th, Mikhal Barla 27th, 33rd, Ignacius Toppo 67th) beat Karnataka 2 (Thimmanna Puliyanda 62nd, Biddappa Karineravanda 67th).

Haryana 5 (Sandeep Singh 3rd, 61st, Manish Rana 19th, 56th, Navin Antil 30th) beat Madhya Pradesh 3 (Ranapratap Singh 11th, Vikas Chaudhary 34th, 40th).