Salalah (Oman): Maninder Singh and Mohammed Raheel scored four and three goals respectively as the Indian men’s hockey team hammered Bangladesh 15-1 in their Asian Hockey 5s World Cup Qualifier campaign opener here.
Maninder struck in the 10th, 18th, 28th, and 30th minutes while Raheel found the target in the 2nd, 15th, and 24th minutes.
Sukhvinder (13th, 22nd), Gurjot Singh (13th, 23rd), Pawan Rajbhar (19th, 26th) scored twice each while Mandeep Mor (8th) and Dipsan Tirkey (9th) struck once each as the Indians scored goals almost at will.
For Bangladesh, Sawon Sarowar (2nd minute) scored the lone goal Tuesday.
India started the match on an attacking mode with Pawan Rajbhar making a dangerous move. But Bangladesh thwarted the move and caught India on the counter-attack with Sarowar scoring the first goal two minutes into the match.
Within seconds, Raheel brought India back to level terms with a powerful shot. After the initial flurry of attacks, both India and Bangladesh started playing cautiously to avoid early goals.
But the stalemate was broken by Indian skipper Mandeep, who struck a stunning goal in the 8th minute to put India in the lead. With goals from Dipsan (9th) and Maninder (10th), India extended their lead to 4-1 in the next couple of minutes.
A stunning save from goalkeeper Suraj Karkera led to an Indian counter-attack and Gurjot (13th) made the most of it, scoring another goal.
Goals from Sukhvinder (13th) and Raheel (15th) closed out the first half with India leading by 7-1.
India began the second half with another attack from the right flank and Maninder (18th) struck to continue the goal-fest for India.
Less than a minute later, Pawan (19th) put his name on the scoresheet with the ninth goal for India. Maintaining possession, India pressed deeper in Bangladesh’s half, and Sukhvinder (22nd) took India’s goal tally to double figures with a shot from near the halfway mark.
Gurjot struck again in the 23rd minute before Raheel (24th) completed his hat-trick a minute later as India continued to toy Bangladesh. Pawan (26th) then scored his second goal of the match.
With two minutes left on the clock, Maninder completed his hat-trick with goals in the 28th and 30th minutes, before adding another at the stroke of final whistle.
PTI
