Tura, Jan 19: East Khasi Hills continued their domination on the sports arena, across multiple disciplines at the 5th Meghalaya Games with most events coming to a close on Friday evening, and on the eve of the closing ceremony they remain the favourites to be crowd champions of the game.
This week has turned out to be an unusual one for Tura and sports in Garo Hills courtesy the hosting of the 5th Meghalaya Games with spectators and sportspersons witnessing the thrill of athletic prowess and the triumph of unity and resilience as the games near their conclusion.
On the eve of the closing ceremony, despite the stiff competition amongst each other a sense of bonhomie has wrapped the athletes across the state who converged in Tura to prove their mettle at these games.
Day 5 of the games continued to thrill spectators and athletes alike, beginning with the high intensity volleyball and basketball tournaments, the adrenaline filled boxing matches, the fast paced ping-pong game of table tennis, the strength and endurance filled game of arm wrestling to cycling for glory.
A young 21 years old miss Phyrnai Kyndait of East Jaintia Hills emerged as one of the rising stars in this Meghalaya Games bagging gold by pedaling to glory in the women’s cycling contest.
The late evening finals of the women’s football event played before a packed audience at the P A Sangma sports complex football stadium, the ladies from Ri Bhoi defeated their counterparts from East Khasi Hills to clinch the gold medal.
The most popular game in Garo Hills which has a huge fan following saw a tight battle for supremacy on the field with neither East Khasi Hills giving way, nor Ri-Bhoi willing to concede either.
Despite long distance passes and short dribbling tactics, neither side was able to net a goal during the full time of 90 minutes. Extra time failed to break the solid defense put up by both teams and ultimately it was left for penalty kicks to clinch the decider.
Ri-Bhoi overcame East Khasi Hills to win the penalties round 3-2 to become the champions of football at the 5th Meghalaya Games. Eastern West district clinched the bronze.
In boxing, the pugilists from East Khasi Hills have jabbed their way into the medals podium bagging the largest number of gold (9), silver (9) and bronze (12). West Jaintia with 3 gold (total 6) and Ri-Bhoi with 2 gold (total 6) were the only other noticeable presence in the ring. From the five districts of Garo Hills only Tura (West) managed to bag one gold, a silver and 3 bronze at the event.
It was a thrilling match on the basketball court in Don Bosco College where the women’s finalists East Khasi Hills took on the West Khasi Hills team. This high voltage game saw East Khasi Hills net 57 baskets to West Khasi Hills’ 44 nets to come up on tops.
In the high energy adrenaline pumped Arm wrestling finals that took place at Don Bosco junior college on Friday, East Khasi Hills and south West Khasi Hills won top honors securing two golds each, while West Khasi Hills, East West Khasi Hills, West Khasi Hills, West Jaintia Hills and East Garo Hills shared a gold each.
The gold medalists in the women category were Pynsuklang Lyngdoh (EWKH), Olivia Dkhar (WJH) and Rikka Ch Marak (EGH), while the men’s section had Brandon Tariang (EKH) and Mebansan Sangma of South West Khasi Hills clinch gold.
The crown for the Champion of Champions in arms wrestling went to Pynskhemborlang Marngar of West Khasi Hills in the male category, whereas in the female category went to Olivia Dkhasr (WJH).
As day 5 of the games drew to a close, East Khasi Hills continued their dream run here at the 5th Meghalaya games increasing their medals tally by a huge margin and beyond the reach of any opponent.