ONGC shoot out Indian Railway

Oil & Natural Gas Corporation staved off a fighting Indian Railway 3-0 (2-2) to lift the 26th Lal Bahadur Shastri hockey tournament at the Shivaji Stadium in the capital on Sunday. Locked 2-2 in regulation time, the Oilmen prevailed in the penalty shootout 3-0.

Sumit Kumar, Gurjant Singh and Vikramjit Singh were on target for ONGC in the shootout, while Indian Railway missed out on all their chances.

In regulation time, the teams displayed fast-paced hockey and tested each other regularly. Sumit put ONGC ahead in the 12th minute through a penalty corner conversion. The Railway team’s reply came four minutes later through Simrandeep Singh, who scored off a penalty corner.

The teams continued to fight it out and it were ONGC who managed to take the lead yet again. Diwakar Ram, the tournament’s highest scorer, was on target in the 29th minute as ONGC led 2-1 at half time.

The second half was keenly fought. The railway team kept ONGC silent in the latter half and equalised when Kush J.P. converted a short corner in the 38th minute, to make it 2-2.

The teams failed to make further inroads, forcing the game into penalties. Indian Railway’s Simrandeep Singh was adjudged the player of the tournament and received a cash prize of Rs 11,000.

ONGC’s Diwakar Ram was named the best scorer of the tournament and was awarded a scooty. The upcoming player award went to Ajit Pandey of Indian Railway, while Indian Oil’s Vivek Sharma earned the outstanding performance memento. ONGC had defeated Indian Oil in the semis, while Indian Railway had downed Air India en route to the final.