Indo-Pak hockey to fire-up Afro-Asian Games
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| India |
October 26, 2003
The Times of India
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HYDERABAD: India will go all out to repeat their Asia Cup final act against a revenge-seeking Pakistani side in their last league match in the men's hockey event Monday.
Although the two Asian giants have already qualified for the semifinals with 100 per cent win record, the match would help determine the pool positions and the opponents for the next stage.
Both the sides have yet to play to their potential in the tournament, but are expected to match each other in skillful play and style.
Considering the recent performances at the international level, India hold a slight edge over Pakistan, a fact conceded by the Pakistan's foreign coach Roelant Oltmans.
"Last couple of years India is playing well. At the moment India are a little further up than Pakistan. But you never know and you cannot say who will win the match between the two sides, which is always exciting" Oltmans told PTI here.
Both the countries have decided to field virtually a second-string team in the competition with Pakistan resting Sohail Abbas, Kashif Jawaid and goalkeeper Ahmed Alam, while Dhanraj Pillay, Baljit Singh Dhillon and Baljit Singh Saini are missing from the Indian side.
Despite their indifferent form, the mood in the Pakistani camp is upbeat for Monday's match, which promises to be a nerve-wrecking one.
Pakistan were given a scare by Nigeria in their opener on Thursday and the team looked out of sorts in the first half in their match against Egypt Saturday. Though Nigeria put up a tough challenge for India too, chief coach Rajinder Singh was quite confident of his boy's abilities.
"We will continue to play as we always do against Pakistan -- go all out and beat them," he said.
Singh, however, was a little wary of the team's performance in the first two matches -- against Egypt and Nigeria -- where the side conceded a few goals.
"We are not poor in defending. Nigeria played a tough game Saturday and so we tried to play safe as we did not want to risk injuries to our players before the crucial matches.
"Deepak (Thakur) got injured which slowed us a bit against Nigeria," the coach said.
A win against Pakistan Monday can help the side in more than one way.
While a victory can boost the morale of the players ahead of the knock out stage, it can also help the side avoid playing South Korea in the semifinals as the Asian Games winners are likely to win their tie against Malaysia Monday for a top-place finish from Pool A.
In that case, India would play either South Africa or Malaysia in the semifinals.
While South Africa, with just one point, need a win against Ghana, Malaysia, having earned four points, need only a draw for a place in the semifinals.
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