Indian Airlines, Punjab in semis

Defending champions Indian Airlines moved into the semi-finals of the 60th senior National hockey championship despite being beaten 2-4 by Services in their last Pool D Super League encounter in Jammu on Wednesday.

Indian Airlines joined Punjab, who blanked Bengal 4-0 earlier in the day in a Pool-C match for their third win, Railways and Punjab and Sindh Bank in the last four of the tournament, which will be played on Friday.

Punjab will take on Pool-A qualifiers Railways in the first semi-final while Indian Airlines will clash with Punjab and Sindh Bank in the other match.

In other matches of the day, Chandigarh defeated Uttar Pradesh by a solitary goal in Pool-C while Border Security Force got the better of Jammu and Kashmir 6-4 in a high scoring Pool-D match.

Both Indian Airlines and BSF had two wins to thier credit from three matches but Indian Airlines qualified for the semi-finals on account of having defeated BSF in the league match.

Indian Airlines, with a number of Olympians in their ranks, started with a bang scoring in the first minute itself when captain Dilip Tirkey converted the first penalty-corner.

The joy was short-lived as Services equalised five minutes later also through a penalty corner.

Both teams raided the opponent's half for about half an hour but failed to convert the chances before Tirkey scored his second goal through a penalty corner in the 30th minute to enable Indian Airlines go into the breather with a 2-1 lead.

Services increased the pressure in the second half and equalised in the 42nd minute when Avtar Singh converted a penalty stroke.

They took the lead three minutes later through a penalty corner conversion by Jurome Kujar and Sosan Topno scored the final goal in the 56th minute to give his team the first victory in the Super League.

Services had earlier lost 3-1 to BSF and drew 2-2 with Jammu and Kashmir.

Indian Airlines, who ended with four points having defeated Jammu and Kashmir 8-0 and BSF 4-1, could convert only two of their six penalty-corners while Services scored through two of the three they got.

Indian Airlines finished with a tally of 14 goals in three matches with captain Dilip Tirkey accounting for five of them. Sameer Dad scored three goals.

Earlier, Punjab played an attacking game against Bengal for their third straight win in the Super League.

Punjab opened their account in the ninth minute when centre forward Surjit Singh scored a field goal.

Baljit Singh made it 2-0 through a penalty-corner in the 22nd minute and the teams went into half-time at that score.

Punjab converted two more penalty corners in the second half with Baljit Singh scoring his second goal in the 52nd minute and Jugraj Singh sounding the board in the 66th to carve out a comfortable 4-0 victory over Bengal who failed to capitalise on five penalty corners.

Punjab, who defeated Chandigarh 2-0 and UP 3-2 in earlier matches, finished with six points having scored nine goals and conceeded two. Baljit Singh top-scored with four goals while Jugraj Singh accounted for three.