Goal glut in junior hockey

Chennai, June 19 (UNI) The city has been experiencing on and off rains since last night and the scene was no different in the St Joseph's TNHA junior national hockey championship as it rained goals for the second successive day today.

In all 77 goals were scored in seven matches with hosts Tamil Nadu notching up a big 24-0 win over Gujarat in Group A.

In other matches, Air India virtually flew high against Kerala thrashing them 11-0 in Group E, Mizoram scored a 5-0 win over Madhya Pradesh in Group C, while Chandigarh subdued Andhra Pradesh 6-3 in Group G.

In the morning matches, Haryana defeated Hyderabad 4-1 in Group C, while Bihar routed Madhya Bharath 16-1 in Group A and Delhi got the better of Chhattisgarh 4-2 in a Group E match.

Portraying the efficacy of the strong forward line where the wingers Heartlin James and B Laxman Karan formed a deadly combination, Tamil Nadu went on a goal riot leading 8-0 at the breather, before slamming 16 goals in the second half in a 28 minute blitz against Gujarat for their second big win.

Heartlin stole the hearts of the sparse gathering slamming seven goals, including five in the second half, while Laxman did not lag behind finding the target seven times, including a hat-trick.

Laxman was more lethal in the second session, scoring all his seven goals. Both Heartlin and Laxman scored 12 of the 16 second half goals as they cut in from the flanks to find the mark repeatedly.

Joining the goal scoring act were Vinod Rayan (four), Shyam Kumar (three) and S Vivek, S Peter Alan Rajesh and D Saravanakumar (one each).

Results: Tamil Nadu-24 (Heartlin James and B Laxman Karan-seven each, Vinod Rayan-four, Shyam Kumar-three, S Vivek, S Peter Alan Rajesh and D Saravanakumar-one each) bt Gujarat-0.

Air India-11 (Ashish Minz, Vinod Kumar, Paramod Dhir-two each, Innocent Kullu, Mayank james, D Mujtaba, Md Imran, Arjun Anil-one each) bt Kerala-0.

Mizoram-five (Lalsingetha-four, including a hat-trick, LalRinunya-one) bt Madhya Pradesh-0.

Chandigarh-six (Rajoth Singh-two, Dharamvir Singh-two, Vreender Singh-one, Harmanbreet singh-one) bt Andhra Pradesh-three (Sandeep Raju-two, Laxman Rao-one).

(ED: PICK UP SUITABLY FROM EARLIER SERIES).

UNI