Delhi Waveriders win against Dabang Mumbai

29th January 2016, Mumbai: Delhi Waveriders today defeated Dabang Mumbai 4-3, in the 11th match of the 4th edition of the Coal India Hockey India League. The match which was being played at the Mahindra Hockey Stadium, Mumbai saw the hosts Dabang Mumbai losing their third consecutive encounter in the tournament so far.

Dabang Mumbai who are yet to register a win in the tournament started their campaign on an attacking note today. The hosts however got the first blow when Rupinder Pal Singh from Delhi Waverider converted a penalty corner in the 8th minute to give the visitors a 1-0 lead. Dabang Mumbai immediately raised their game and came back to score through star German forward Florian Fuchs in the 12th minute, giving a 2-1 lead to the hosts. The second quarter saw a lot of penetrations from Delhi Waveriders into the Dabang Mumbai circle, but the hosts gave a spectacular display of their defence to deny any conversion chances to the visitors. The first half came to an end with a score of 2-1 in favour of Dabang Mumbai.

The second half started with a flurry of attacks from Dabang Mumbai but the visitors played cleverly and were rewarded with a penalty corner in the 39th minute and Rupinder Pal Singh made no mistakes to score the equaliser for Delhi Waveriders. The home team in response started pressing hard and took a much needed lead of 3-2 from a penalty stroke in the 54th minute through Harmanpreet Singh. The visitors scored two minutes later in the 56th minute through an excellent field goal from Talwinder Singh to finally snatch the victory from the home team.  Delhi Waveriders finished the match defeating hosts Dabang Mumbai 4-3 to share the top spot in the points tally (16 points) with Ranchi Rays.

The Coal India Goal of the Match award of INR 50,000 was presented by Mr. Surojit Sarkar, Regional Manager - Finance, Coal India Limited to Dabang Mumbai's Florian Fuchs, while Devon Manchester from Delhi Waveriders walked away with the Most Entertaining Player of the Match award. Dabang Mumbai Captain Matthew Swann won the Man of the Match award of INR 50,000 while his team mate Affan Yousuf won the INR 25,000 Hero Emerging Player of the Match award.

The next match of the 4th edition of the Coal India Hockey India League will be played between Defending Champions Ranchi Rays and Jaypee Punjab Warriors at the Astro Turf Stadium in Ranchi on 30th January 2016.