Five-star Central Railway rout Mumbai Police to enter semis

Goal-mouth action from the HMSL match between Central Railway and Mumbai Police yesterday. Pic/Sayyed Sameer Abedi

Central Railway (CR) stormed into the semi-finals of the Hockey Mumbai Super League with a commanding 5-0 win over Mumbai Police (MP) at the Don Bosco turf, Matunga, yesterday.

CR blitzed the MP defence as soon as the match began, scoring all five goals within the first 18 minutes.

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Rajendra Pawar opened the scoring in the fourth minute with a precise strike into the bottom-left corner, setting the tone of the game. Aditya Rasal then converted a penalty corner, sending the ball soaring into the top-right corner to double the lead in the 11th minute.

Two minutes later, Love Singh extended the margin to 3-0 with a skillful reverse-hit into the top-left corner.

In the 16th minute, Mayur Nalavde made it 4-0 with another successful penalty corner conversion. Zaid Mohammad then completed thr rout (18th min) by slotting the ball into the bottom-right corner to give CR a 5-0 win.

Earlier, in another quarter-final, Mumbai Port Authority beat Police Boys 5-2.