In the semi-finals, played at the National Stadium, Birsamunda scrapped past BAV Inter College (Meerut) by a solitary goal and St Ignatius drubbed DAV (Shahabad) 8-0.

In a keenly-fought first game, the Rourkela boys were kept on their toes all the time by a solid defence of the Meerut college boys. The two teams had their chances but over enthusiasm and aimless shooting did them in as they spilled several opportunities. BAV, in particular, was guilty of not able to convert those five penalty corners into account.

The match started on a cautious note with the teams taking their time to open up. The Meerut outfit, with a good forwardline, swarmed the rival defence and were successful in forcing them on the backfoot. But when it came to scoring, they lacked the sting and Rourkela defenders were able to clear the ball. Their goalkeeper Naresh Ojha did a splendid job to keep the Meerut boys out of harm's way.

Birsamunda time and again probed their rivals making deep inroads. But they only wasted time in the circle without scoring. However, on return they seemed to have brought some sense into their attack and within nine minutes of resumption they struck through Bikas Topno, whose opportunism came in handy. After that nothing happened as the teams played hockey without a purpose.

In the second semis, the Gumla boys were on a goal-scoring spree. Starting their onslaught from the 10th minute, they continued until their eighth goal in the 56th minute, only to relax a bit later.

Roplal Xalxo (3), Theodar Baa (2), Sebian Jojo, Ignace Aijd and Xavier Jojo were the scorers for them.

Club hockey: In the club hockey of the Nehru tournament, Hawks Club (Rupnagar) humiliated United Club from Kamptee13-1 after leading 7-1. In a totally one-sided match, the Punjab club side scored at will without having to sweat it out. Of the six scorers for the side, only Vikram Saini was able to strike a hat-trick. Other scorers included Sukh Amritpal, Kulbir Singh (3), Rajesh Kumar, Gurpreet (2) and Kanwalpreet.

For the losers, the consolation goal-getter was Fiyaz Khan, who converted a penalty corner for his team. The team from Vidharba seemed totally out of place in a tournament where country's top clubs are participating. Even yesterday, the team went down meekly against Bharti Club from Jabalpur.

Yesterday, at least they tried to put up some kind of a resistance and making some moves. Today, it was a pathetic show against a far superior rival from Rupnagar. But one cannot blame the side from Vidharbha for a poor show. For, the Hawks Club had a solid defence and hardly let the Kamptee forwards come into their circle. On the other hand, their forwards made easy inroads into the rival territory almost at will. Keeping the maximum ball possession, the team opened the account through Sukh Amritpal in the 11th minute. Kulbir followed it up with two goals soon after.

Then Vikram completed a hat-trick before Kulbir struck once more. Rajesh Kumar added one more to the tally and it was Gurpreet's turn to do the act. He struck twice and Kanwalpreet completed the tally.

The other match, however, was somewhat evenly balanced with Nehru Youth Training Centre from Bhopal winning over Metro Hockey Club from Bangalore 4-2. Mohd. Sameer (2), Mohd. Waseem and Farzan-ur-Rehman scored for the winners while Naveen Krishnan and Navneesh Waran struck for the losers.