Prabhjot Singh rediscovered his scintillating form of the past to score a hat-trick and help India Dark Blues outplay Youngsters Hockey Club of Pakistan 4-1 in the 16th Lal Bahadur Shastri hockey tournament at Shivaji Stadium in New Delhi on Tuesday.
In another match, India Juniors pipped Telekom Malaysia 3-2.
The tie between Blues and Youngsters Club turned out to be a delight for the home crowd as the Indians stuck to their plans and launched ceaseless attacks on their opponents' post.
Prabhdeep Singh's clean hit off a penalty corner brought the early lead for Blues in the fourth minute.
The Blues forwardline kept the Pakistan defenders busy and on many occasions missed the scoring chances by a whisker. The scoreline 1-0 at the break didn't tell the Indian team's dominance in the first half.
Thanks to Prabhjot, the second session turned out to be a worse tale for the Pakistanis.
In the 38th minute, from the right Jaswinder Singh provided a nice pass to the ace striker who struck home through a reverse flick.
Two minutes later Prabhjot took the ball himself to sound the board in a similar fashion.
Soon after, Kashif Ali narrowed the margin for Youngsters Club by scoring off a penalty corner.
However, Prabhjot completed his hat-trick in the 52nd minute by getting a pass from Arjun Halappa and ended all the hopes for the foreigners. He was adjudged the man-of-the-match.
Towards the end, both sides intensified their attacks.
The Pak team earned three back to back penalty corners in the final minute but in vain.
With this win Blues have entered the semifinals of the tournament.
Earlier, defender Kuldeep Bhadoria, who scored twice to be nominated the man-of-the-match, played an important role in India Juniors' win over Telekom Malaysia.
At the half-time, the juniors were 1-0 up. But the Malaysians exhibited some fighting spirit to lead the match at one stage through goals by I Vickneswaran and NF Md Nor.
India Juniors came back to overtake the Malaysians, who missed the services of Indian stars Dhanraj Pillay and Len Aiyappa, well before the end.
Tomorrow, India under-18 will play against India Juniors and India Light Blues will meet India Dark Blues.
