Mixed luck for Vidarbha in National Kho-Kho Championship

NAGPUR: The third day of the 50th National Kho-Kho Championship brought mixed luck for the hosts. While Vidarbha men registered their third successive victory to enter the knock-out stage in style, hosts women crashed out of the competition following their second defeat in three matches at the Yashwant Stadium here on Friday.
The five-day prestigious tournament is being organized jointly by Nagpur Municipal Corporation and Vidarbha Kho-Kho Association.
Both the teams of Maharashtra and Kolhapur advanced to the next stage with an excellent fine performance to keep alive their challenge in the tourney.
Vidarbha men thumped Chhattisgarh 13-12 with 5 minutes and 50 seconds to spare in their third league outing. With this hat-trick of wins, Vidarbha topped Group H to seal their berth in the last 16. Dilraj Singh Sengar, Akash Kaore, Navin Nandurkar and Manoj Ghotekar excelled for the hosts. Chhattisgarh's Bhuvaneshwar and PK Reddy tried hard but could not prevent defeat for their side.
In their earlier ties, Vidarbha men had beaten Manipur and Chandigarh in the four-team group.
However, it was disappointment for the Vidarbha eves as they lost to 8-12 against West Bengal. Mousami Tarapdar, Megha Das and Jyoti Vishwakarma combined well to floor Vidarbha. For the hosts, captain Dipali Sabane, Sweety Zendekar and Supriya Ghugare fought hard but lacked support from others.
In the first match, Punjab had defeated Vidarbha, while in the second outing the hosts had downed Goa.
Maharashtra (Group A) and Kolhapur (Group D) topped their respective groups in the men's section.
In the women's category, Maharashtra (Group A) and Kolhapur (Group E) maintained their unbeaten streak to reach the knock-outs.