Raghunath scored the golden goal to take India to the semis. India defeats fighting Malaysia 5-4 at Radburg in an excitig fight back. Despite taking 2-0 lead Indian defence caved in, allowing Malaysia to take 2-4 lead. In the last ten minutes Yuvraj and Sunil helped India to cancel out the lead, and then left Raghuath to do the golden job.
Veteran Raghuath unleashed a penalty corner in the 85th minute, even after the hooter went off, that got deflected into the goal by rival goalie S. Kumar. Its a sweet golden goal for India, the same variety that Malaysia used to undo India in the last Asian Games.
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Sandeep Sigh scored two goals in the first half, two out of two from penalty corers. Sikir scored for Malaysia two minutes before the half time.
Malasia scored thrice in the second half and led India 4-2; however India scored twice in the last ten minutes to take the match into extra time.
Tregku showed his repertoire of skills to eter the circle, and ear a pealty corner two minutes before the extra-time hooter, but Idia survived. Earlier in the first half of extra time, it’s Malaysians who were up in the proceedings, still wasting two one-to-one chance to score the golden goal.
Gurbaj tackles from behind, gets yellow in the fifth minute. But it not deter India from attacking which fetced its first Penalty Corner. Sandeep Singh banged the left corner of the board (1-0) to give India early lead in the seventh minute.
Rupinder trips Faizal on the circle line, concedes a penalty corner and also gets himself a yellow, second straight yellow for India. First runner charges and clears. Tengku got a loose ball on the right side of the circle, set a parallel pass that meacigly rolled across the net, a close shave for India. Sikri too missed a great chance to equalize, his divig deflection did not find the angle, leaving Sreejesh to do the rescue act in the 17th minute.
The spate of yellow continued, Manpreet getting it in the 20th minute.
Brendra Lakra and Yuvraj o the left flank combined beautifully o the left flak, o surprise the latter got it a pealty corner. This time sadeep made a high flick that hit the top inside net (2-0) in the 24th miute.
India coceded a goal two minutes from the half time. Getting a push from right angle, Sikiri pulled India goalie Sreejesh off foot before gently scoppig the ball into the empty net (2-1).
A minute later India survived a similar scare, but Rupinder controlled the damage.
The half time score stood 2-1 I favour of India.
India was on backfoot early in the second half, which left gaps in its defence. After missing two close calls, Azlan Misron scored the second equalizer (2-2) in the 42nd minute. He placed the ball above the head of Sreejesh who charged early, the unguarded ball rolled freely into the net.
Sarwanjit-Juvraj combination got India’s third penalty corner; but first charger Baljit Chaurn blocked Sandeep’s flick, and also collided with Rupinder Singh. Rupinder had to be taken out of the field in a stretcher.
Tenkgu Abdul got a lose ball, took the first shot, Srjeesh blocked but when did the same again on the rebound, Sreejesh was bit lethargic and allowed the ball to get past to his right (3-0). 23 minutes were now left for India to make a match of it.
As Gurbaj Singh with the ball was tripped near the baseline, India got its fourth penalty corner in the 53rd minoute; it was of no use. Sandeep was not on the field, Ragunath took, his igh flick was wide.
Azlan deflected the penalty corner, its second, from close range, a copy book act to enhace the lead (4-2) in the 56th minute.
Indians made mess of their clearance that led to a Malaysian attack, it turned out that manufacturing a penalty corner was watt e Malaysians know well. So, it was penalty corner no three for Malasia but tis time the defence stood well. Still 12 minutes left India go for the kill, and it did appear so, as they seem lost the nerve to go up.
Meanwhile Sreejesh single handedly denied rampaging Malaysians at least two more goals.
Yuvraj sent in a high, second rebound six minutes before the hooter to give India semblance of fight back (3-4).
Four minutes before the hooter, Yuvraj and Sunil surged ahead, and got their fourth penalty corner.
Its Baljit Charun who raised the stick above the shoulder to concede the penalt corner. Sandeep Singh took a grounder, Kumar Subramaniam spotted its flight and delflected but the ball was rolling slowly, leaving Sunil to tap in (4-4).
Then came the extra-time, rest is history
2 Comments
I watched the whole game live. India were pathetic in defence and pretty clueless in attack too. So many of our players lost possession due to poor ball control or soft, careless passes. Both Sandeep & Ragunath looked slow in defence and there was zero marking in the 2nd half. 2-3 Malaysian passes saw our goal under threat and if it wasn’t for Sreejesh, we would have lost in normal time. None of the youngsters showed anything special. Only Sardara and Sunil looked good. Most of our other experienced players (Gurbaj, Halappa, Shivendra and Sarwanjit) were poor.
Nobbs has done nothing of note so far. We are playing as badly as we did with our own coaches. Brasa’s teams looked better than this.
I am agree. I don’t see any improvement. This way, We can not compete with top six teams.
We need good defense and midfield.
Thanks
Rajeev