Black Horse Paints/Artema Medical and Samba Bank recorded thrilling victories in the Hamdan Polo Cup for Lahore Open Polo Championship 2019 here at the Lahore Polo Club ground on Friday.

In the first match of the day, Black Horse Paints/Arthema Medical beat Platinum Horse/Olympia by a narrow margin of 8-7. Hamza Mawaz Khan emerged as hero of the day with fabulous four goals while Ahmed Bilal Riaz hit a hat-trick and Daniyal Sheikh converted one. From the losing side, Amirreza Behboudi fired in five goals while Ghulam Mustafa Monnoo and Ahmed Ali Tiwana chipped in with a goal.

The first goal of the match proved to be a well-contested chukker, where after a tough fight and a series of attack from both sides, Platinum Homes managed to take a slight 4-3 lead over Black Horse. Platinum Homes maintained their edge by converting two goals against one by Black Horse as by the end of the chukker, they were enjoying 6-4 lead.

The third chukker was evenly poised as both the teams converted one goal apiece to make it 7-5 while Black Horse made a tremendous by thrashing two back-to-back goals to level the score at 7-7. No more goal was scored by both the sides till the final whistle, thus the matched entered the sudden death chukker, Ahmed Bilal Riaz smashed in a match-winning goal for Black Horse.

The second match also proved to be a thriller as Samba Bank edged out Master Paints Black by 7-6. Adnan Jalil Azam and Edward Banner Eve were the stars of the day from the winning side, as both hammered a hat-trick each while Syed Turab Rizvi struck one. From the losing side, Manuel Carranza fired in fabulous five goals and Ahmed Zubair Butt one but their efforts were futile in the end.

Samba Bank opened their account with a field goal to take 1-0 lead while Master Paints Black fought back well to take back 2-1 lead by banging in a brace. Master Paints Black stretch their lead to 3-1 in the beginning of the second chukker but Samba Bank then changed their gears, and hit a hat-trick of goals to have 4-3 edge.

The third chukker was evenly poised as one goal each was struck by both the teams with Samba Bank still enjoying 5-4 lead. The fourth and last chukker saw both the sides fighting well and launching a series of attacks on each other's goals and succeeded in converting two goals each and when the final whistle was blown, Samba Bank were enjoying slight 7-6 lead, which declared them winners.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2019