Chennai, Jan 9 (PTI) JSW Soorma Club registered a thrilling 3-1 shootout victory against Hyderabad Toofans after a 1-1 stalemate in the regulation time in their men’s Hockey India League (HIL) match here on Friday.
Captain Harmanpreet Singh (20th) scored for Soorma while Amandeep Lakra (46th) found the target for Hyderabad Toofans in the regulation time.
The first quarter saw a lot of circle entries and chances but the defenders on both sides were resilient and stopped all the attacks.
Soorma started the game strong and won the first penalty corner in the third minute but Harmanpreet’s attempt was stopped by the first rusher.
Moments later, Soorma made two good attempts on goal as they piled on the pressure on Hyderabad Toofans but goalkeeper Bikramjit Singh made incredible back-to-back saves to deny them the opening goal.
In the eighth minute, Toofans won three penalty corners in a row but Soorma’s backline did well to protect their goal.
The game opened up in the second quarter as Harmanpreet (20th) converted a penalty corner in the 20th minute for Soorma with a low-driven drag-flick that found the bottom left corner of the goal to take the lead.
Soorma controlled the tempo of the game for the remaining part of the quarter as they headed into the second half with a slim lead in hand.
In the 34th minute, Toofans came extremely close to finding a goal as Amandeep Lakra’s powerful flick from a penalty corner went narrowly off target.
Four minutes later on the other end, Soorma were awarded a penalty corner. Jeremy Hayward took the shot this time for Soorma but Bikramjit made another brilliant save for Toofans to maintain the deficit.
Toofans were awarded a crucial penalty corner in the initial minutes of the final quarter as Amandeep Lakra (46th) rose to the occasion and delivered a powerful drag-flick to score the equaliser for Toofans.
In the 54th minute, Toofans made another good move as Devindar Walmiki played an incisive pass into the circle from the right flank but Tim Brand’s deflection went inches away from the goal.
Toofans continued to put pressure in the late stages as Arshdeep Singh did well to hold the ball in the circle and unleash a back-handed shot on goal. However, Soorma goalkeeper Vincent Vanasch made a strong save to keep the scores level as the match went into a shootout.
Soorma won the shootout 3-1 as Harmanpreet and Nicolas Keenan scored from their attempts.
In the end, Toofans’ goalkeeper Bikramjit gave away a penalty stroke due to a stick-check during Nicolas della Torre’s attempt. Harmanpreet stepped up and capped off his strong performance by converting the stroke and claiming the bonus point for JSW Soorma. PTI PDS AM PDS AM AM
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