Azlan Shah Cup: India ride on Sunil strike to down Pakistan

SV Sunil struck in the dying moments as India downed Pakistan 2-1 in a pulsating encounter at the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup hockey tournament in Ipoh on Thursday.

But the win may have come a little too late as India ended their campaign with nine points from six games. Two other teams — Argentina (nine points from five matches) and Great Britain (eight points from five) — stand a better chance of making the final against New Zealand, who reached the title round on Thursday with a 4-1 rout of Malaysia.

The Black Sticks are on 12 points with a match to go against Korea on Saturday. Friday is a rest day.

Striker Sunil, who has returned a mixed bag of late, dived to guide the ball into the goal in the 69th minute after Sardar Singh created the opening with a superb pass.

Sandeep Singh scored India's first goal in the 30th minute off a penalty corner but Pakistan found parity when Sohail Abbas returned the compliment with a firm shot in the 59th minute.

Chief coach Michael Nobbs said he had focused on a few extra training sessions to sharpen the players' finishing skills which paid dividends in the game against Pakistan.

"We have been playing well and not finishing. We made more of an effort to rectify this by some extra training sessions which helped," he told TOI.

"It was a typical hard-fought match against Pakistan, the first half we were dominant and were unlucky not to have scored more.

The second half mostly belonged to Pakistan. They had a few shots on goal but goalkeeper Bharat Chetri and the defense were solid and we held them to solitary goal," the Aussie said.

"Our attacks in the second half were fewer but had more potency and we earned more shots and penalty corners. Some brilliant play by Birendra Lakra and Sardar and a wonderful diving goal by Sunil sealed the victory for us. We deserved the victory," he added.

The Indians get a two-day break before the classification matches and final on Sunday.

Results: India 2 (Sandeep Singh 31st, SV Sunil 69th) bt Pakistan 1 (Sohail Abbas 61st). Great Britain 1 (Jonty Clarke 50) bt South Korea 1 (Yoon Sung Hoon 22nd). New Zealand 4 (Ryan Archibald 5, Shea McAleese 16, Nick Wilson 33, Shay Neal 61) bt Malaysia 1 (Hafifi Hafiz Hanafi 45).