Bhubaneswar: Spectators at the Kalinga Stadium, Bhubaneswar today witnessed an exciting encounter where the visiting team the Jaypee Punjab Warriors ended Kalinga Lancers winning run, by defeating the home team 4-1. The visitors emerged victorious through strikes from Simon Orchard and Satbir Singh respectively. This was the first loss for Kalinga Lancers after four consecutive wins in the 4th Coal India Hockey India League.
The first quarter of the match started with attacking intent straightaway from the home team but Jaypee Punjab Warriors showed good defensive skills to keep the hosts at bay as both the teams looked dangerous on the counter attack. The second quarter started with the home team getting defensive as the visitors raised their pace in the game. Jaypee Punjab Warriors started pressing hard but the possession was still majorly controlled by the Kalinga Lancers who were looking very strong in the midfield. Punjab came close on many occasions including four failed back to back penalty corners, which were beautifully saved by Andrew Charter leading to a goal less first half.
The third quarter saw both the teams pushing hard for a goal. The away team looked dangerous in the initial minutes, but the home team were equally dangerous on the counter attack. Kalinga Lancers finally managed to break the defensive deadlock of the Jaypee Punjab Warriors in the 42nd minute, when star striker Glenn Turner made no mistakes in converting a penalty corner, giving the home team a much needed 1-0 lead in the game. The third quarter ended with the scoreboard reading 1-0 in favour of the home team. The final quarter started with Kalinga Lancers trying hard to capitalise on their lead in the early moments of the quarter but an excellent interception by Sardar Singh foiled the home team’s ambitions and the visitors scored a field goal through Simon Orchard in the 48th minute giving a 2-1 lead to Jaypee Punjab Warriors.
The Lancers pressed really hard after this but the Punjab defence was way too strong for them to break. In the process Jaypee Punjab Warriors scored their second field goal in the 58th minute through Satbir Singh to take the score to 4-1 in the favour of Jaypee Punjab Warriors. The match ended with the score board reading 4-1 in the favour of Jaypee Punjab Warriors.
The Coal India Goal of the Match award of INR 50,000 was presented by Shri Anil Kumar Jha, CMD MCL to Simon Orchard from Jaypee Punjab Warriors while team mate SV Sunil won the Most Entertaining Player of the Match award. Simon Orchard from Jaypee Punjab Warriors also walked away with the Man of the Match award of INR 50,000 while Mathew Dawson from Kalinga Lancers won the Hero Emerging Player of the Match award of INR 25,000.
The next match of the 4th Coal India Hockey India League will be played between Kalinga Lancers and the defending Champions Ranchi Rays at Kalinga Stadium in Bhubaneswar on 8th February 2016. The six team annual franchise based hockey league, the flagship event of Hockey India - the apex body governing the sport in the country and sanctioned by the International Hockey Federation (FIH) is being played across six venues in India from 18th January - 21st February 2016
