Friday, November 26, 2021
Pool A: South Africa 5 Chile 1
Pool C: South Korea 5 USA 1
Pool C: Netherlands 3 Spain 2
Pool D: Germany 3 Argentina 2
Pool A: Belgium 1 Malaysia 1

S2H Team

Outlandish scorelines took a break at the 2021 FIH Men’s Junior World Cup on Friday.

Defences seemed to find their feet, none exemplifying it more than Malaysia who eked out a shock 1-1 draw with Belgium in Pool A.

The Asians played a resilient defensive game, soaking up all the pressure that the 2016 runners-up piled on them for most of 60 minutes of play.

They refused Belgium’s invitation to come up and play, preferring to pack the defence and wait for the counterattack they launched from time to time.

Malaysia, who have goalkeeper and player of the match Shahrul Saupi to thank, even had the audacity to take the lead through Asahar Amirul following a penalty corner on the stroke of halftime and leave the young Red Lions to play catch up in the second half.

Belgium needed to wait until the 49th minute to level the score – Thibeau Stockbroekx drag-flicking home a penalty corner — after which they made a frenetic push for the winner that all but arrived.

Malaysia play South Africa in the last round in the pool followed after Belgium take on Chile.

A draw would be enough for Malaysia to book a spot in the quarterfinals but South Africa, who need a win, are expected to play with the adrenaline rushing following their 5-1 win over Chile.

Belgium should put it across Chile but one wonders whether they’d want to top the pool and play India – likely to finish second in Pool B after a shock loss to France.

Or for that matter whether France, who take on Canada in their concluding pool match, would fancy topping the pool and take on Belgium in the quarterfinals.

After 70 goals and records were broken three times in five matches on Thursday, normalcy returned to the Kalinga blue turf.

A sedate 24 goals were scored in five encounters today but no quarterfinalists were confirmed even though commentators declared a few already were.

South Africa beat Chile 5-1 in the first match of the day, South Korea did USA in by the same score before The Netherlands beat Spain 3-2 in a thrilling encounter, the Dutch winner coming less than two minutes from the end.

There was much to applaud as Germany pipped a fighting Argentina 3-2 to put one foot in the quarterfinals before Belgium and Malaysia ended the day’s proceedings with an absorbing contest.

The first match tomorrow will pit Pakistan against Egypt in pool D. Belgium play Chile next followed by South vs Malaysia which will decide the fate of pool A.

Quarterfinal qualifiers from Pool B will be decided when France play Canada before India take the pitch against Poland.

Sunday will be the last day of the league phase with pool C and D playing out their last round of matches.