Gagan Ajit struck a hattrick

Hyderabad: Powered by a brilliant hattrick by international Gagan Ajit Singh, Punjab spanked Jharkand 8-1 while Mumbai and Bengal had easy wins over their respective rivals in the 61st senior national hockey championship here Saturday.

In a late charge, after Punjab were leading 4-1, Indian forward Gagan Ajit made mockery of the weak Jharkhand defence, slamming the ball home in the 45th, 67th and 68th minutes while comeback hero Jugraj Singh provided the icing on the cake to net in the 69th minute as the men from the north notched up a convincing victory.

Vijay Topno scored the consolation goal for Jharkand.

In the other matches, Tamil Nadu beat Delhi by a solitary goal scored by Sarvan Kumar while Universities defeated Bihar 5-1.

Railways scraped past Bhopal (Red) 2-1 to register their second win in as many encounters.

Sunil Sorin scored the winner for Bengal in the pool H match against Orissa while Himachal Pradesh held Nagaland 2-2 in pool G.

After being level at 2-2 during half time, Arif Baig, S.M. Tabrez and Iqbal Ahmed found the mark as Bhopal (Blue) beat Chhattisgarh 5-2. Iqbal and Arif scored a brace each while Suryamani scored the goals for Chhattisgarh.

In a one-sided match Vidarbha drubbed Uttaranchal 3-0.