LAHORE : Hamza Mawaz Khan’s heroics helped Master Paints rout BBJ Pipes by 11-5 in the International Steels National Open Polo Championship for Quaid-e-Azam Gold Cup 2019 match played here at Lahore Polo Club ground on Monday.
Hamza smashed in superb six goals while Juan Cruz Losada fired in four goals and Saqib Khan Khakwani one. From the losing side, Nicolas Corti scored a quartet and Ahmed Zubair Butt one.
Losada started the first chukker with a field goal to provide Master Paints 1-0 lead while they added two more in their tally in the second chukker to further enhance their lead to 3-0 while BBJ Pipes also slammed in two to reduce the margin to 3-2. Master Paints showed their dominance in the third chukker by hammering a hat-trick – two by Hamza and one by Losada – to stretch their lead to 6-2. BBJ then reduced the margin to 6-3 but Losada struck one more to finish the chukker with Master Paints having 7-3 edge.
In the beginning of the fourth chukker, BBJ Pipes got a 40-yard penalty, which they successfully converted through Nicolas to make it 7-4. Master Paints then showed some aggression and pumped in two back-to-back goals to finish the fourth chukker having 9-4 lead. In the fifth and last chukker, Master Paints slammed in two more goals as against one by BBJ Pipes to win the match by 11-5. Nicolas Scortichini and Martin Fewster supervised the match as field umpires while Shah Qublai Alam acted as match referee.
Today (Tuesday), an important match will be contested between Diamond Paints/Newage and Master Paints Black at 3:30 pm.
