BPCL outclass Indian Oil in battle of star-studded teams

Holders Bharat Petroleum (BPCL) overwhelmed a lacklustre Indian Oil in a disappointing semi final contest between two Bengaluru teams spruced up by current and former internationals in the Dabang Mumbai 50th Bombay Gold Cup hockey tournament here today.
BPCL won the largely one-sided clash 4-2 with the final goal of the game by last year's runners-up Indian Oil coming in the very last minute of the game which helped the losers reduce the margin of defeat.
In the final tomorrow, BPCL would face Comptroller and Audit General of Delhi. The latter edged out local outfit Western Railway 4-2 in the tie-break after the teams were locked 2-2 a the end of 70 minutes' play.

The first semi finals promised exciting fare but proved to be a let-down with Indian Oil, the 2013 champions, looking listless for the major part of the game.
They, in fact, secured five penalty corners and despite possessing two top drag-flickers in current international V R Raghunath and Gurjinder Singh, could score only off the last one - and that too in an indirect manner when captain and veteran forward Deepak Thakur found the target.
Thakur had scored earlier with an angular effort in the 11th minute to bring Indian Oil on level terms after Ravi Pal had given BPCL an 8th minute lead by scooping goalwards after cutting in from the left byline and the ball was deflected in by an Indian Oil defender in a goalmouth scrimmage.

But two penalty corner goals in the space of six minutes by Gurpreet Singh helped BPCL troop out at half time with a handy 3-1 lead which they made 4-1 early in the second half through a field effort by Manpreet Singh.

BPCL then defended their citadel with gusto to prevent any meaningful thrust by the IoL players till a last-minute penalty corner award helped the latter to reduce the margin.
In the second semi final, Deepanshu Bhargav and Darshan D S scored for CAG in regular period while Jaikiran and Manjinder found the mark for Western.
In the tie break contest, CAG got the goals through Nitin Thimmiaah, Naemuddin Mohammad, Bhargav and Sarbjit Singh while for Western Vinod Kumar Singh and Stanley Minz found the mark.