Hockey National Cships: Defending champions Punjab lose to Manipur in shootout

Chennai: Defending champions Punjab were knocked out in the quarterfinals by Manipur in the ongoing Hockey India Senior Men's National Championship, at the Mayor Radhakrishnan Hockey Stadium on Wednesday.

After an enthralling 3-3 draw, thanks to a hattrick from Manipur's Cyril Lugun, the ensuing shootout saw Manipur go through 4-3 winners, causing a huge upset in the tournament.

Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and Karnataka are the other teams that have progressed through to the semis along with Manipur.

After Cyril gave Manipur the lead from a penalty corner in the 13th minute, Punjab struck twice in six minutes, courtesy of goals from Maninder Singh and Ravneet Singh.

After halftime, Manipur got back the lead in the 51st minute, thanks to two more goals from Cyril, who completed a superb hattrick.

But Manipur couldn't hold on to their lead as Punjab equalized in the 59th minute, with Ravneet Singh once again bringing his team back on level terms.

In the following penalty shootout, Manipur held their nerve and Punjab's Gursahibjit Singh missed the decisive penalty, handing Manipur a spot in the semifinals.

Manipur's goalkeeper Hemam Dhanaraj Singh emerged as the hero for their side, pulling off a crucial save in the penalty shootout.

Tamil Nadu's journey comes to a halt

A lot was expected from the Tamil Nadu team heading into the quarterfinals and although they faced a stiff challenge against Uttar Pradesh, they were still expected to put up a fight.

But the host team faced a 1-3 defeat in the hands of Uttar Pradesh, who progressed to the last four thanks to goals from Chandan Singh, Rajkumar Pal, and Lalit Kumar Upadhyay.

For Tamil Nadu, Shanmugavel S scored the solitary goal which turned out to be nothing more than a consolation.

After three consecutive defeats in the last three editions, Uttar Pradesh finally have their revenge against Tamil Nadu with a win today.

Haryana put five in the final quarter against Maharashtra, who were leading 1-0 after three quarters, to win 5-1, with Rohit scoring a brilliant seven-minute hattrick.

The final match of the day featuring Karnataka and Odisha turned out to be a thriller, with Odisha winning the match in a penalty shootout.

After going 0-2 down in the first quarter, Odisha stormed back to make it 2-2 and then trailed 2-3 but once again, managed to pull things back at 3-3.

With the game heading into a shoot-out, Odisha held their nerve, and thanks to a brilliant display by their goalkeeper, they won the shootout 3-1 and progressed to the semifinals.

The semifinals are scheduled to be played on the 15th of November, starting from 2 PM, IST, at the Mayor Radhakrishnan Hockey Stadium in Chennai.