TIRUNELVELI: Maharashtra and Punjab joined Kerala and Bihar to complete the semifinal line up of the 24th National Junior Women’s Hockey Championship in progress here.
Both the quarterfinal matches this evening were listless.
The lone goal scored by right extreme Pradnya Barvea few minutesaftera barren first half enabled holders Maharashtra to progress to the last four stages of the tournament while Punjab got the better of Kamatnka by an odd goal in three, Punjab end 10 at the lemon break,
In the semifinals Maharashtra will on Punjab, while Kerala meet Bihar.
The Punjab girls played to a pattern and raided the Karnataka citadel time and again, Punjab in all achieved six penalty comers.
On the other hand, Karnataka girls playing for the fourth consecutive day. looked a tired lot. They, however, made sporadic raids into the Punjab area,
Punjab went into the lead throughout Centre half Harjit Kaur, who found the target following a penalty corner. Bhupinder Kaur, left extreme, enabled Punjab increase the lead with a beautiful goal. She collected a ball near the 25 yard line and sped down inside the circle. After dodging past two defenders, Bhupinder drove in for the goal with the goalkeeper looking on.
Karnataka girls pressed hard to reduce the margin achieving it in the 34th minute, Right extreme BM. Geetha collected a free hit taken by Kaveri Poovapa and her first timer went in like bullet.
Earlier, Kerala stormed into the semifinal, defeating Chandigarh 32 while Bihar toyed with PEPSU holding on to their 30 lead in the first half In an absorbing encounter, while the Kerala girls who had won both their previous league matches on the same gravel surfaced ground did not find any problem, the ground upset the rhythm of the Chandigarh girls.
The teams shared two goals at the breather and four at the end of the regulation time Kerala struck another goal in the second half of the extra time to win the match 32.
Article extracted from this publication >> January 20, 1989
