NEW DELHI, February 16: An inspired performance by Samir Suhag, who converted 10 of the 11 penalties, took India to a deserving 16-10 win against Australia in the second of the two match series, in the zonal play-off for the fifth World Cup Polo Championship (14 goals), at Melbourne on Saturday.After the first match loss, Harshwardhan Singh did a good job of marking Aussie captain Rookie Baillien. But despite the emphatic win, the Indian team, sponsored by the Oberoi Group of Hotels and IPA, could not log enough points to make it to the World Cup finals. While Australia scored 25 goals in the two matches, India had only 23.For India, Harshwardhan Singh and Lokendra Singh scored two goals each, while Dhruvpal Godara got one.In the first match, Australia defeated India 15-7. Though the match looked evenly poised till the fourth chukker, with Australia leading 8-7, the next two chukkers saw the hosts slamming 7 goals and closing out the issue.Aussie captain Rookie Baillieu did most of the damage withhis 13 goals, while the Indian scorers were Samir Suhag (3), captain Lokendra Singh (2), and Harshwardhan Singh (2).Shamsheer Ali stars in Hyd winHYDERABAD Chaugan beat Delhi by 10 1/2 goals to 1 in the semi-finals of the Junior IPA Polo Championship tournament at the Army Equestrian Centre ground to set up a final meeting with IMA. Hyderabad got into top gear right from the start with three quick goals in the first chukker. Maintaining the same tempo, they hit home three goals in both the second and third chukkers to take their tally to 91/2 - 1. Both the teams scored one each in the final chukker. It was a good outing for Shamsheer Ali had who slammed home five, while Basheer got four and Yogeshwar Singh scored one goal for the winners who started on a 1/2 goal handicap. Simran Shergill was the only scorer for the hosts.Teams:Hyd: Shamsheer Ali (+2), Basheer Ali (+1), Yogeshwar Singh (0), Jaideep Singh (-2); Delhi: Samarth Shergill (0), Simran Shergill (+0), Jaisal Singh (+1), BrijrajSingh (+1).
