Hockey: India face Pakistan hurdle

The Indian hockey team continued its unbeaten run by fighting back from a goal down to hold Malaysia 2-2 in the Asian Champions Trophy on Wednesday. Meanwhile, Pakistan beat South Korea 3-2 to set up a virtual semifinal with India on Friday in order to clinch a place in the summit clash.

Pakistan are on top of the table with nine points followed by India with eight. Japan are third on seven points with Korea stationed fourth having six in their kitty. That puts four teams with a possibility of entering the final. Michael Nobbs’ men will have to beat them in order to enter the final.

India can afford a draw provided Malaysia beat Japan. India could then sneak into the final on a better goal average that too if Korea beat China, the lowest ranked team in the tournament.
Goal averages would also count for Pakistan and Korea if India beat Pakistan. The safest bet for India, however, would be to beat Pakistan.

Earlier on Wednesday, India failed to register a win against the gritty Malaysians. The scorers for India were Ravi Pal (9th) and Danish Mujtaba (52nd). For Malaysia, the goals were struck by Tajuddin Jalil (24th) and Muhammad Amin Rahim (32nd).
India got their first goal in the ninth minute through Pal. Malaysia scored the equaliser when Jalil deflected in the flick past Indian goalkeeper Sreejesh in the 25th minute.

In the 32nd minute, Malaysia took the lead off an awful Indian error. Struggling against the man-to-man marking of the Malaysians, India finally managed to break their hold in the 53rd minute when Gurbaz moved down the right flank and centered brilliantly as a diving Danish Mujtaba sent the ball into the goal for the equaliser.

Stopwatch: India 2 (Ravi Pal 9th, Danish Mujtaba 52nd) drew with Malaysia 2 (Tajuddin Jalil 24th, Md Amin Rahim 32nd); Japan 3 (Kazuyuki Ozawa 35th, Shinji Kawauchi 45th, Tanaka Kenta 53rd) bt China 1 (Song Yi 27th); Pakistan 3 (Md Waqas 7th, Md Irfan 13th, Shafqat Rasool 57th) bt S Korea 2 (Sun Cho 43rd, Hyun Woo Nam 52nd)