Hockey on a high
Pakistan had to prove that the Asiad victory was no fluke plus the momentum needed to be carried forward. Pakistan, who had won the tournament thon three occasions were unable to reach the podium in the last five outings at the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup.
The first match was against New Zealand, ranked a place higher than Pakistan’s eighth spot in the international rankings. Moreover, the Kiwis had won all the last five matches against the Greenshirts. Pakistanis dominated throughout and emerged 4-2 victors.
Next were South Korea, the highest ranked Asian team and quite often Pakistan’s nemesis on the big stage. Pakistan twice came from behind and netted three goals in the last seven minutes, in an unbelievable spell, to again win by a 4-2 score-line. The Korean team’s hallmark has always been their fitness; scoring three goals in last minutes against them is no mean feat.
England, the current European champions and world no 4, only feature as Great Britain close to the Olympics. The 2012 Olympics are in London and hockey is getting the biggest financial support among all the team sports by the British Olympic Association. Therefore, this time the Great Britain team was sent quite early since Olympic gold is their target. It was an excellent match and once again Pakistanis showed grit and never gave up. The match between the two evenly-matched sides could have gone either way but luck favoured the Europeans who won 3-2. Having netted their third goal in the 64th minute, Pakistan could have even equalised in the last minutes but Sohail’s penalty corner strike missed the mark.
Australia, the reigning holders of World, Commonwealth and the Champions Trophy titles outplayed Pakistan in the fourth match, especially in the second half. After a competitive first half (1-2), Pakistan completely crumbled in the second session and the Aussies ran away with a 5-1 win. This was not only a great disappointment but also raised doubts about Pakistan’s status in the big league.
But the boys showed great character to overcome the humiliation in the next match. No need telling the pressure of an Indo-Pak tie, more so as Pakistan had lost all the last four encounters against their traditional rivals. After trailing by a goal at half-time, Pakistan outplayed their opponents in the next 35 minutes inflicting a 3-1 defeat.
Back in contention for a spot in the final, they encountered the hosts in the last league game. Pakistan managed a hard fought 3-2 victory over the Malaysians.
So the stage was set for the final against the mighty Aussies, the only unbeaten side in the competition. Most of the people were giving Pakistan no chance especially considering the league encounter between the two. However, Pakistan defied all the odds and truly matched the world champions in what turned out to be one of the finest finals of the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup. Twice Australia went ahead and twice Pakistan levelled. The classic match went into the extra-time. Both sides had their chances but the Aussies availed their third penalty corner of the added time to score the golden goal thus adding the Sultan Shah Cup to their impressive collection of trophies.
Pakistan had some compensation when their mercurial striker Shakeel Abbasi was declared the player of the tournament and Sohail Abbas ended as the joint top-scorer.
Importantly, Pakistan had many gains from the 10-day tournament.
They defeated all the three Asian sides thus proving their Asiad gold was fully deserved.
Pakistan displayed great fighting spirit throughout, coming from behind in a number of matches including the final. Then bouncing back from a 1-5 trouncing to win the next tie against the arch-rivals India was also a remarkable show of resilience.
Barring the league match against the eventual champions, Pakistan were almost always better than their rivals in the second half, a testimony to the physical fitness; lack of which has been so often the cause of their undoing. The goals were widely spread among the players as ten of them figured on the scoring chart, an evidence of team’s all round strength.
At the same time, and as always, there are points of concern. The team is still dependent on Sohail Abbas for penalty corner conversion. The scorer of highest number of goals in international hockey is not that sharp a drag flicker as he used to be. The rout against Australia in the league match was attributed to fatigue due to the fourth match in five days. Such an explanation for poor performance at the international level is not acceptable. Most of the teams had come without many of their first choice players mainly due to injuries or club commitments in the European leagues. Pakistan were also without Salman Akbar and Zeeshan Ashraf but other sides missed the services of several star players. For instance Australia had left nine of their front liners including the four-time world player of the year, Jamie Dwyer. Only hosts Malaysia and Great Britain were at full strength.
Still, Pakistan’s act was praiseworthy and the national team has definitely carried forward the momentum gained at the Asian Games.
If the performance graph rises in the same proportion over the period leading up to the London 2012 then the nation can hope for an Olympic medal after a gap of 20 years.
P.S: It was really unfortunate that no channel in Pakistan televised any of the matches including the final.
