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Six teams participated in the first volleyball tournament organised by Sohni Dharti at Al Khor recently.
Every captain was given an opportunity on his turn to pick the player of his choice. Teams’ names were given after the names of different provinces of Pakistan viz Punjab Six Pack, Sindh Hitmen, KPK Smashers, Baluchistan Safe Sets, Gilgit Crossfires’ and Kashmir Net Masters.
The tournament kicked off with the speech of Chairman Sohni Dharti, Rana Anwar Ali who emphasised on the importance of sports events and physical activities.
Punjab Six Pack and Sindh Hitmen faced each other on the opening day. Both teams played fairly well.
Punjab team stood victorious in a very tight game. Then KPK Smashers started their campaign against a much settled and confident Baluchistan team. As expected, Baluchistan won that match quite easily. The tournament got momentum from day two as it started to attract more audience including families and kids as well. All six teams had to play against each other on league basis. Punjab and Baluchistan won their matches until they battled against each other. That game turned out to be a real thriller and a nail biter. Nadeem Abbas, the captain of Punjab and Zafar Chandio, who led Baluchistan were on their best in that game. Both of their net men were equally up to the mark. The match went down to the wire and Punjab managed to sneak in finally.
Meanwhile KPK team started to show some muscles and opened their account against Kashmir team. Kashmir team showed good fighting spirit but they couldn’t recover from their first two defeats. Sindh and Gilgit played some good games in patches. Sindh and KPK managed to qualify for the semifinals leaving Gilgit and Kashmir on the bottom of the table.
Punjab and Sindh encountered in the first semifinal and much to surprise, Sindh won the first set making Nadeem, the captain of Punjab to sweat and dive here and there to win the second set. Third set started with all players being pumped up and heating up a bit especially the Sindh Captain. Punjab finally managed to win and qualified for the final.
Grand finale was played between Punjab and Baluchistan, the two most deserving teams. Punjab planned their strategy well and did not give away the points on service which has been the trade mark of Baluchistan team. Punjab team played like champions and won the final and crowned as the champion of the first edition. They did not lose a single match in the entire tournament.
KPK and Baluchistan played second semi-final with the expectations of KPK a much confident and settled team to win but it did not happen as expected. Baluchistan played like a professional team and won the match quite easily.
