Jharkhand, Railways & Haryana enter Semi-finals

Bhopal: Jharkhand scored a hard fought 1-0 win against Odisha while to defending champions Indian Railways routed Uttar Pradesh 10-1 to enter the semi-finals of second Hockey India Senior Women National Championship, here today.

Haryana, which raced to a 6-1 win against Chandigarh, was the other team to make the semi-finals. After a goalless half, Jharkhand scored through Sushila Lakra in the 47th minute to win this match. Scoring five goals in each half, Railways trounced their opponents. Giving early breakthrough to Railways were forwards Roselin Dung Dung and skipper Jasjeet Kaur who opened account scoring with goals in the fifth and eighth minutes respectively. Jasjeet topped the score list for Railways with three goals followed by Roselin Dung Dung (2), Vandana Katariya (2), Sushila Chanu (1), Deepika Thakur (1) and Ritu Rani (1) while opponents only reply came through Pratibha Chaudhary. However, Uttar Pradesh were unable to build on the early break as they committed far too many errors in their defence to allow Railways to gain the upper hand. "Considering the strength and composition of our team that had both experienced and young players, I am satisfied with our performance. We will try to do better in the semi-finals and then finals to retain the title" said Jasjeet. In the second quarterfinal match of the day Navneet Kaur and Ramandeep Kaur scored twice each as Haryana beat 6-1 win against Chandigarh. Chandigarh who led 1-0 at the half time scored through Anu Bala in the 27th minute but struggled to find any rhythm or flow in their remaining game. Haryana got a good breakthrough and leveled the score when Jaspreet Kaur successfully converted penalty corner in the 39th minute. Two minutes later Udita scored another goal for Haryana. Thereafter Haryana stepped up the pace and found the target in the 51st and 54th minute through Ramandeep Kaur. Centre forward Navneet scored in the 55th and 69th minute. PTI