{"id":1527,"date":"2016-04-16T13:50:51","date_gmt":"2016-04-16T13:50:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/?p=1527"},"modified":"2016-04-26T13:10:52","modified_gmt":"2016-04-26T13:10:52","slug":"x","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/?p=1527","title":{"rendered":"Pakistan beat Japan; India set up Australia final"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"16ap\"<\/a>Pakistan destined Japan to the bottom of the table with a comfortable 4-1 win in their final group match at the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup hockey tournament in Ipoh.
\nThe win also ensured Pakistan qualify for the fifth placing playoff tomorrow.
\n\u201cWe are hapy to have picked up our second win and qualify for the playoff.
\nIt will be a tougher match but it will also help us gain more experience that this side needs, said Pakistan coach KM Junaid.
\nHe added that his main goal was to ensure that the playing structure the team is being built upon is strengthened.
\nJapan, who had lost all their games in the competition, came back strongly in the fourth quarter but exposed their back in their attempt to search for goals.
\nDiscarding the defensive approach that they had adopted against Australia, Japan played a more open game against the SAF Games champions.
\nHaving not beaten the Pakistani in any of their previous meetings and having lost 0-7 in their last match up at the Asia Cup in 2013, Japan were again not good enough.
\nPakistan dominated the possession but did not find the opening goal until the 20th minute.
\nJust as it looked like Pakistan were not taking their chances well inside the D, Ali Shan picked up the ball in close range inside the D slotted the ball past Takashi Yoshikawa.
\nWithin four minutes they had doubled the lead.
\nAbbas Tasawar dazzled his way past the Japanese defense but his attempt from an acute angle hit the post and fell on to the path of Rizwan Ali, Rizwan had the easiest of task to tap the ball into an open goal.
\nJapan began to tighten their game and played with more cohesion towards the end of the third quarter and began to make some headway inside the Pakistani D.
\nIn the 48th minute Shota Yamada, who had squandered three previous attempt was on target this time with a direct hit that had Imran Butt beaten.
\nHardly had the Japanese side settled down when, Pakistan struck back.
\nThey quickly swarmed the Japanese goalmouth and in the melee M Arslan Qadir slotted the ball in past Takashi Yoshikawa.
\nArslan found his second of the match in the 57th minute.
\nRizwan Ali dribbled his way to top D before making an attempt at goal.
\nArslan, who was lurking near the Japanese keeper and deflected the ball into goal.
\nArslan, who is now the tournament top scorer with six goals to his name, was also picked as the Man of the MatchIndia stormed into final of the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup hockey with a 6-1 demolition of Malaysia in their crucial final group match.
\nIndia will play Australia in the final while Malaysia plays New Zealand in the third placing playoff.
\nIndia needed just a simple win to make it to the final while Malaysia needed an eight goal margin of victory.
\nBut it was the Indians who came out hungrier with their aggressive play from the first whistle.
\nIt was the worst defeat inflicted upon the Malaysians in the tournament.
\nMalaysia had lost 1-5 to Australia in their preliminary round match, the same score line India lost to the Kookaburras in their opening game.
\nHowever, the final match between the two Rio Olympic bound teams can be a cracker.
\nLast year Australia easily beat New Zealand in their opening match but lost the final to the Black Sticks.
\n\u201cThe whole team did what I wanted today and the scoreline was pleasing,\u201d said Indian coach Roelant Oltmans.
\n\u201c\u00cdf they played like today, there is a chance for them to win the tournament.
\nLet\u2019s see what we have learnt from our first game against them.
\nThe scoreline was harsh as we played a good game.
\nI am hoping for a reasonable outcome tomorrow.
\nBring the same style of hockey we played against Malaysia and we will surely entertain the crowd,\u201d he added.
\nAustralia ended their preliminary rounds of the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup unbeaten.
\nHaving already qualified for the finals earlier, the favourites easily defeated Canada 3-0 in their final group match.
\nAustralia were on top of the Canadians throughout the game.
\nThey kept control of the ball possession and hardly gave Canada any decent attempts into their D until the final quarter.
\nIn the 16th minute, from second penalty corner, Australia finally found the opening goal.<\/p>\n

Source: Nation<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pakistan destined Japan to the bottom of the table with a comfortable 4-1 win in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1529,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[5,9,3,33],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/16ap.jpg",800,600,false],"thumbnail":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/16ap-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/16ap-300x225.jpg",300,225,true],"medium_large":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/16ap.jpg",640,480,false],"large":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/16ap.jpg",640,480,false],"1536x1536":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/16ap.jpg",800,600,false],"2048x2048":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/16ap.jpg",800,600,false],"enternews-featured":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/16ap.jpg",800,600,false],"enternews-medium":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/16ap.jpg",633,475,false],"enternews-thumbnail":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/16ap.jpg",420,315,false]},"author_info":{"display_name":"admin","author_link":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/?author=1"},"category_info":"Stories<\/a>","tag_info":"Stories","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1527"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1527"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1527\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1531,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1527\/revisions\/1531"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}