Pune beat Nashik 9-0, lift first senior women hockey championship title

Lopsided is the word to describe the final between Pune and Nashik as the home team thrashed opponents 9-0 to lift the senior women’s hockey championship title at Shiv Chhatrapati sports complex on Saturday.

The dominance of Pune was evident from the first hooter as during the 60 minutes of play the ball only crossed the opponents’ D twice, in the last quarter, giving the home side goalkeepers a rest day.

Pune used two goalkeepers – Monini Adagale (1st half) and Arzoo Pansare (2nd half). Nothing came to Adagale’s way while Pansare faced one penalty corner in the final quarter which her captain Bhavana Khade, standing to her left, saved. “I wanted to give a chance to Arzoo to boost her confidence as she saved two goals nicely at the end. Otherwise, it was an easy day for goal keepers,” said William D’souza, coach of Pune team.

“Our defence was so strong that we did not give their forwards any chance to take the ball ahead. It was a dominating performance,” said Bhavana.

Pune team was strong on passing skills and kept the ball to themselves during most part of the game. The tactic produced result in the first minute of the match as Rutuja Pisal scored a goal which was assisted by Akshata Dekhale. Second goal came six minutes later as Shraddha Tiwary made no mistake to convert penalty corner successfully.

Second quarter saw Nashik goalkeeper Jagruti Jadhav saving a couple of goals to slow down the game, but it turned out to be a short-lived joy as Vaishnavi Phalke scored the third goal of the match via penalty corner in the 14th minute. Pune was rewarded with one more penalty corner four minutes later and Akshata (18th) made it 4-0.

After resumption of the match, nothing changed as Nashik failed to break the deadlock. It was in 54th minutes when Nashik had a chance to reduce the deficit, but Pune goalkeeper Pansare was alert at the goal post.

Whereas for Pune, Phalke completed hat trick (44th, 59th) while Pisal added one more to her name in 43rd minute. Goal each was scored by Ankita Sapate (34th) and Bhavana (42nd) to complete the dominating victory.

All 18 get chance to play matches: D’souza

William D’souza who coached the junior and senior teams during the state championship was a happy man at the conclusion of the tournament on Saturday.

“Junior team made many mistakes in the final while converting penalty corners, but the senior side was strong and dominated all the matches. All the 18 girls of my team got a chance to play hockey in the last three days,” he said.

In the 46th minute of the match, D’souza did three substitution at a time as his team was leading 8-0.

“I wanted to give chance to younger players of the team as well. All delivered satisfactory performance,” D’souza said.

Results:

Pune 9 (Rutuja Pisal 1st, 43rd, Shraddha Tiwary 7th, Vaishnavi Phalke 14th, 44th, 59th, Akshata Dekale 18th, Ankita Sapate 34th, Bhavana Khade,42nd) bt Nashik 0.

From the dugout

Team gave 100 per cent in the final. Finishing skills of the team were also up to the mark and the team had strong defence so we did not give any chance to opponents.

Bhavana Khade, Pune captain, winner

We don’t practice regularly so coordination becomes a problem in our team. The girls in Pune team play hockey regularly so that makes the difference.

Payal Chumbale, Nashik vice-captain