Salta (Argentina), December 13
India’s hopes of booking a berth in next year’s Champions Trophy were shattered as they went down fighting to arch rivals Pakistan 3-6 in a thrilling semifinal encounter of the Champions Challenge I hockey tournament here.
In-form India, who were Group A toppers with an unbeaten record, failed to find the bearings at the last four match. They dominated for most part of the match but failed to convert the chances that came their way.
As is often happened in Indian hockey team, the opponents scored from the few chances they got and Pakistan were 3-1 up at the end of half time.
India now face Argentina for the third-place play-off. Pakistan play New Zealand in the summit clash and winner will qualify for the 2010 Champions Trophy in Germany. New Zealand had beaten Argentina 3-2 in the other semifinal.
All the Indian goals came from penalty corners through Dhananjay Mahadik (eighth and 62nd minutes) and Diwakar Ram (67th minute). For Pakistan, Rehan Butt (2nd, 29th and 64th) scored a hat-trick of field goals while Sohail Abbas (32nd, 70th) found the target twice and Haseem Khan (58th) got one.
As early as the second minute, goalkeeper Adrian D’Souza failed to stop a seemingly harmless shot by Rehan Butt to concede the lead to Pakistan and from then onwards India were doing the catch-up job.
India though equalised quickly in the eighth minute with Dhananjay Mahadik sounding the board with a well-executed penalty corner. India were then playing with one-man advantage with a Pakistani player cooling off for five minutes at the bench for a dangerous foul.
Adrian made up for his initial mistake by stopping Rehan at the top of circle. But there was little he could do on a phenomenal shot by Rehan in 29th minute which gave Pakistan the lead.
Penalty-corner specialist Sohail Abbas then found the target three minutes later and Pakistan were leading 3-1 going into the breather. After resumption, India got a couple of chances only to be wasted. Excellent work by captain Rajpal Singh earned them a penalty-corner but India could not convert it. — PTI