After the perfect opening ceremony on Tuesday, ONGC Himachal Pradesh Football festival had a splendid second day with attractive brand of football being played out by teams participating from all over the state.

The day started on a high note with DFA Solan thrashing DFA Kangra 7-0. Luv Preet hit the back of the net three times in a space of five minutes, getting the first hat-trick of the ONGC Youth Football Festival. Debakar opened the scoring as early as in the second minutes before Sudhir hit a brace in the 14 and 24 minutes. And to round off the match, Jaspreet added the 7th in the 43rd minute of the game.

However, the Solan team had to bow out of the tournament in the hard fought second round match against DFA Una. After the scoreline was locked at 1-1 at the end of the stipulated 60 minutes, the winner was decided through tie-breaker where Una defeated Solan 4-2.

Meanwhile SAI Kangra entered the main phase of the tournament where they will battle it out for the trophy with top teams from other states. After defeating DFA Mandi 5-2 in the morning, they run riot the host Sirmour Red 2-0. In the morning, Chander scored three goals and added two more in evening against the host to take his tally to 5. Sajan and Himangshu scored the other two goals in their 5-2 win against DFA Mandi.

Meanwhile the match between Pinegrow School, Solan and DFA Hamirpur turned out to be the most intensively battled one with the former losing out by a goal. Ishant Rana was the hero for the Hamirpur side, scoring in the 40th minute.

The two other match of the day turned out to be a one sided affair where Hosts’ 2nd team, Sirmour Blue, thrashed DFA Kirnoor 9-0 while Dharamshala Football Academy thrashed DFA Shimla 6-0. For Sirmour, Amit scored 3 goals, Ranjan and Kapil scored 2 each while Vivek and Vikram got one each.

And for the team from Dharamshala, Deepak was the star player who pumped in three goals as Abhilakshya scored two. Mukh also scored one.

With three other teams from the state to be decided later today, the main phase of the tournament will kick off tomorrow where 4 state teams will rub shoulders with teams from other parts of the country.

Sanjeev Katwal, OSD to Himachal Chief Minister inaugurated the 6-day U-14 ONGC Youth Football Festival last evening at Nahan Chaugan. As many as 25 teams from Himachal and other parts of the country are participating in this festival.

(Himachal Pradesh Football Association Press Release)