Finally, spirited Indians make a point

India and Malaysia shared the spoils in a 2-2 draw in the seven-nation Sultan Azlan Shah Cup hockey tournament at the National Stadium here ...

India and Malaysia shared the spoils in a 2-2 draw in the seven-nation Sultan Azlan Shah Cup hockey tournament at the National Stadium here today. In one of the better matches of the tournament so far, both sides played with passion before settling for a draw. Len Aiyappa (21st minute) and Arjun Halappa (62nd) scored for India and the Malaysians replied through Gobinathan Krishnamurthy (32nd) and Ismail Abu (64th).

India picked up their first point after two defeats, while Malaysia moved to two with two draws and a loss.

The Indian attacks were incisive despite some needless individual play by a couple of their forwards, notably Baljeet Singh Dhillon.

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In the 17th minute Kuhan Shanmuganathan foiled Len Aiyappa’s penalty corner attempt with a goal-line save before the Indian managed to find the boards with his next try in the 21st. Despite a couple of lapses, the Malaysians continued to attack and Gobinathan found the board in the 32nd minute to restore parity .

The pace picked up noticeably in the second-half that witnessed exciting end-to-end play with a lot of goalmouth action. Both the teams wasted quite a few chances as both goalkeepers were kept busy.

For a brief period, the two most experienced Indian players, Dhanraj Pillay and Dhillon left the ground, the former being substituted and the latter with an injury. Ironically, thereafter the Indian forwardline seem to function better.

Eventually, the Indians managed to score when Halappa deflected a centre from Prabhdeep Singh in the 62nd minute (2-1). Malaysia equalised two minutes later through Abu to deny India the victory.(PTI)