HP Youth Football Festival - Stage set for exciting semifinals!

Mahilpur Football Academy, Punjab and Prayag United SC continued their good run in the 'ONGC' Himachal Pradesh Youth Football Festival and booked their berth in the semifinals alongside Mohun Bagan AC and Sambalpur Football Academy.

The semifinals to be played tomorrow will see red hot Mohun Bagan AC taking on Mahilpur Football Academy while Sambalpur Football Academy will face Prayag United SC. The winners of the semifinals will play the final match under floodlights tomorrow itself.

Sunday will also witness the four local teams, who have qualified for the tournament, playing for the Himachal Pradesh Under-14 Championship title. In the first semifinal, SAI FA will take on DFA Solan. And in the second semifinal, DPS Solan will play DFA Sirmour. The winners will play for the title in the evening.

In late evening matches on Friday, the Punjab side once again demolished their opponents, this time DFA Solan by 5-0 before Prayag United overcame host DFA Sirmour 3-1. With both the teams having won two of their matches, they qualified for the semifinals.

Harpreet scored the first goal of the evening in the 7th minute before Baljeet doubled it in the 14th minute. The local side was giving them stiff resistance till the dying minutes before they came all out attacking. In the process they were caught on the counter and the visitors pumped in three more goals to give the scoreline an clear look. Rajveer, Jaswinder and Kamaljeet were the scorers.

Meanwhile, Prayag United, who were expected to have an easy game came in for a rude shock when the hosts held them goalless at half-time. But after the break they regrouped well as Pradeep scored off a long-ranger. Sujay Rawat doubled the score in the 50th minute before Sanjeev Bhatta killed the match in the 62nd minutes. Vivek got the consolation goal for the host in the 69th minute.

Meanwhile in today's matches, which were of little consequence, Calicut Football Academy and SAI Kangra played out a 2-2 draw. Sujeen gave the Kangra team the lead in the 18th minute before Calicut replied with a quick brace in the form of Leon Augustine (26th) and Angle R. Bao (27th). Rohit however restored parity in the 40th minute.

In the second match of the day played between Yamunanagar Football Academy and DPS Solan, Rahul scored the sole goal of the match to give Yamunanagar Football Academy the victory.