India

India 6---Malaysia 4
Pakistan 2---South Korea 0

Hyderabad, Oct. 29: Devesh Chauhan was India’s man of the hour in the men’s hockey semi-final of the Afro-Asian Games here on Wednesday as the off-colour hosts edged past a fighting Malaysia and into a title showdown with Pakistan by an eventual 6-4 margin.

After full-time and extra-time ended in a 1-1 deadlock, Chauhan successfully kept out Boon Huat Chua’s push in the tie-breaker and the edge was sufficient to see the Indians through.

For India, Arjun Halappa, Bimal Lakra, Gagan Ajit Singh, Prabhjot Singh and Kanwalpreet Singh converted their penalty pushes successfully while for Malaysia, Keevan Raj Kali, Kuhau and Mohammed Amin Rahim were on target.

Earlier, India went into the lead in the 21st minute through a Halappa field goal but Malaysians struck back almost immediately to level the scores through Chua. In the second session the Indians came close on numerous occasions but could not finish, while the desperately unlucky Malaysians can feel hard done by when they had at least one goal disallowed in the closing half.

In the first-semi-final earlier, Pakistan punished a wayward South Korea 2-0, scoring once in each half. In a match dominated by Koreans, the nine penalty corners they forced being the fair indication of the game, Pakistan survived some anxious moments as the nippy South East Asian nation frittered away chances galore.

Gazanfar Ali made no mistake with a high and hard push after Pakistan’s third penalty corner in the 33rd minute. Incidentally, it was the last such award for Pakistan in the entire match. Pakistan’s attack revolved mainly around Salim Khalid, Rehan Butt and Tariq Aziz on the right flank while midfielders Gazanfar on the right and Waseem Ali on left initiated some good counterattacks to force Koreans onto the backfoot.

Even as Korea was struggling to find its feet in the rival striking circle, a brilliant counter-attack from left in the 64th minute saw inside forward Zeeshan Ashraf sprint into the rival 25-yards and set-up Shakeel Abbasi for the kill with a through ball past on-rushing custodian Dong Sik.

Korea, who had six Sydney Olympians in the side, came up with trademark hockey, fast and hard but the otherwise slick finishers missed chances they shouldn’t have. Earlier, Egypt got the better of Ghana by a 11th minute goal coming from Sameh Metwally Mohammed. South Africa routed Nigeria 4-0 with Craig Fulton, Gareth Carr, Steve Philips and Denzil Dolly scoring. The winner led 3-0 before the teams changed ends. The winners will now clash for the 5-6 spots while the losers play for the last two spots.

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