India continued its unbeaten run in the competition with a 3-0 win against Japan in the final league match of the Asian Champions Trophy here on Sunday to storm into the semifinals top of the table. The result put the two teams on course for a repeat clash in the last four with Japan also booking a spot in the knockouts as the 4th ranked side despite the loss.
This was India’s sixth win over Japan in seven encounters but Japan had won the last time the teams faced off earlier this year, scoring the lone goal of the match to pip India for the last Olympic spot. That ended India’s Paris hopes and led to an overhaul of the entire team and coaching staff. And although the Japanese team here is completely different, the heartbreak of that defeat continues to rankle.
It was visible in the Indian team’s performance on field, dominating completely throughout with little space or opportunity for Japan to get a look-in. Japan managed a handful of entries into the circle in the first half and barely any in the 2nd but India’s dominance can be gauged from the fact that while the Indian defence cleared any danger, the Indian goalkeepers, alternating in the goal every quarter, were never called in to make a save.
If anything, India should have scored at least a few more goals but were denied as much by their own mistakes as Japanese goalkeeper Yu Kudo. The former was a result of a hurry to score while the latter was unpassable, brining off three back-to-back saves from Indian forwards off penalty corners twice in the match besides multiple other saves. Coach Harendra Singh had admitted that the Indians only needed to get effective shots at the goal but the host seemed unable to find them, remaining goalless in the first half.
It required Navneet Kaur’s experience to finally break the deadlock in the 37th minute, running in with a backpass from Lalremsiami’s free hit and shooting a reverse hit into the board as the Japan defence and Kudo appeared unprepared. It was almost anti-climactic but expected, after all the well-planned efforts and moves till then. Two PC conversions by Deepika in as many minutes at the beginning of the final quarter made it 3-0 for an easy win as India took another step towards retaining its title.
Earlier, Jinzhuang Tan converted two of China’s five PCs for a 2-0 win against Korea, who crashed out of contention for a semifinal spot. Malaysia completed the semifinal line-up with its second win in the competition, a 2-0 victory against Thailand that set it up against China for a spot in the final.
The results: Malaysia 2 (Nur Azhar, Nur Mohammed) bt Thailand 0; China 2 (Jinzhuang Tan 2) bt Korea 0; India 3 (Deepika 2, Navneet Kaur) bt Japan 0.
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