Murugappa Semi-Final Race: PNB Need Seven Goals Against Railways, Malaysia Must Beat Navy or Go Home
Two pool games left, two semi-final places still to settle, and one of them needs a miracle. The Murugappa Gold Cup has saved its best arithmetic for last.
Start with Pool A, where Indian Railways are already through. The defending champions have won all three of their games, nine points, six goals scored and one conceded, and they go into the final pool game against Punjab National Bank with nothing to lose and a semi-final place already banked. PNB have everything to lose, and then some.
Indian Army sit second on five points from four games, after Wednesday’s 2-2 draw with IOCL. PNB are on two points from three games. For PNB to leapfrog Army and take the second semi-final spot, they must beat Railways by at least seven goals. Seven. Not win. Win by seven. Army’s goal difference is plus three, PNB’s is minus four, and PNB have a game in hand, so a seven-goal win would take PNB to five points and past Army on goal difference. Anything less, and Army go through, however nervous the wait has been. Army’s draw with IOCL, Sunil Yadav and Jobanpreet Singh scoring from penalty strokes either side of Cyril Lugun’s corner and Uthappa’s late equaliser, suddenly looks like a very good point. PNB have scored eight and conceded 12 in three games. Scoring seven against the tightest defence in the pool, a side that has conceded once all tournament, is a big ask. That’s the polite way of putting it.
Pool B is simpler, and crueller. BPCL are already through as pool winners, ten points from four games, after Wednesday’s 5-5 classic with Indian Navy. The second spot comes down to one game: Indian Navy against Malaysia’s juniors.
Navy are on five points from three games, unbeaten, and a draw is enough. A draw takes them to six, past Tamil Nadu on five, and Malaysia, who would stay on three, can’t catch them. Malaysia must win. A win takes the young side to six points, past Navy on five, and into the semi-finals. There is no other route.
That’s a brutal assignment for a young team at the end of a brutal week. Malaysia’s juniors won the Sultan of Johor Cup final on Saturday night in Malaysia, arrived in Chennai on Sunday, beat SAI-NCOE 2-1 on Tuesday, and then lost 4-2 to Tamil Nadu on Wednesday, a game Tamil Nadu had wrapped up by half-time at 3-1. The legs have looked heavier with every game, and Navy are fresh, unbeaten, and need only a draw. But Malaysia have shown all week that they don’t fold. They fought back against BPCL in a 1-0 defeat, they beat SAI when it mattered, and they scored twice against Tamil Nadu even when the game was gone. If they find one more big performance, they’re in the last four. If they don’t, their tournament ends with a week they’ll still be proud of.
The semi-finals are on Saturday 31 October, and the final is on Sunday 1 November at the Mayor Radhakrishnan Stadium in Chennai. The prize money is seven lakh rupees for the winners and five lakh for the runners-up. Two games to go, and the last four is almost set. Almost.
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