Favourites Central Zone lift Suksar men’s hockey title

SIBU (Jan 18): Favourites Central Zone lifted the Sarawak Games III (Suksar) men’s hockey title after edging the Northern Zone 4-2 in today’s finals at the Bukit Lima Indoor Stadium.

Joeton George opened scoring in the fourth minute before teammate Ted Ranieri Tugang found the net again in the sixth minute to give Central Zone a 2-0 lead in the first half.

Unperturbed, Northern Zone came back strongly in the second half.

Against the run of play, Northern Zone’s Augustine Gatlin achieved a double strike in the 13th and 15th minute to level the score 2-2.

With the match wide open, there was a frantic search for goals from both sides, turning the game ugly when a northern player was injured.

That could have demoralised the northerners and Central Zone capitalised on that advantage to score two late goals through Joeton in the 20th minute and Addit Abdullah in the 21st minute for the title win.

In another interesting encounter, Northern Zone took the women’s title after beating Southern Zone 2-1.

Both teams played cautiously initially, ending the first half scoreless.

Northern Zone’s Nur Aziera Zaidil then broke the deadlock in the 15th minute when she dribbled the ball in from the left corner.

However, southerner Joen Junatan retaliated immediately to even the score.

Shifaa Dhiya Ujang then scored from outside the box in the 20th minute and that would be the deciding goal for the title.

Third place for the men’s and women’s teams went to Southern Zone and Central Zone respectively.

Central Zone team manager Jutim Joem expressed satisfaction with the team’s performance.

“We hit our target of one gold from the men’s team and we achieved that. We are also happy with the performance of the boys who played quite an impressive game and were able to control the game well and played according to books,” he said.

In the last edition, Jutim said Central Zone managed to get one gold medal from the men’s team and one silver medal from the women’s team.

“Though our women’s team ended up getting the bronze medal, we are also grateful to them for trying their best to get the result,” he said.

Kuching Resident Norlela Shariff presented the prizes.

Among those present were Southern Zone chef-de-mission Caroline Cleophas Joseph and Sarawak Sports Corporation chief executive officer Awang Putra Yusrie Awang Redzuan.