Another Bronze!

A misfiring India were made to toil hard before getting the better of archrivals Pakistan 43 in a pulsating thirdfourth place contest to clinch the bronze medal at the Asian Champions Trophy hockey tournament here on WednesdayAfter having topped the roundrobin stages the Tokyo Olympics bronze medallists were far from impressive in their last two games and the Manpreet Singhled side had to play out of its skin to outwit Pakistan and finish on the podiumAfter being stunned by Japan 35 in the semifinal on Tuesday much was expected from India against Pakistan They did press hard and created numerous chances including 11 penalty corners out of which they made use of just twoIndia will thus return with a consolation prizeThe Indian team took the lead in the first minute through vicecaptain Harmanpreet Singh before Sumit 45th Varun Kumar 53rd and Akashdeep Singh 57th struck a goal eachPakistanrsquos goals were scored by Afraz 10th Abdul Rana 33rd and Ahmed Nadeem 57th It was Indiarsquos second win over Pakistan in the tournament after having beaten them 31 earlierSuper startIndia started the match on a bright note pressing the Pakistani defence from the onset Unlike against Japan India came out attacking and secured four penalty corners straightaway the last of which was converted by Harmanpreet with a low flick in the first minute The Indians kept up the pressure with numerous raids inside the Pakistan circle but failed to create a clearcut chancePakistan grew in confidence as time passed by and drew level in the 10th minute courtesy some sloppy defending by the Indians and Afraz did enough to get past onrushing goalkeeper Krishan Bahadur PathakIt was a fighting contest in the second quarter as Pakistan defended in numbers to deny their neighboursAt the stroke of the halftime hooter India secured their eighth penalty corner but as has been the case the finishing was not up to the mark Three minutes after the change of ends it was Pakistan who surged ahead when Abdul Rana scored from a rebound from the teamrsquos second penalty cornerPulsating finishThree seconds from the third quarter Gursahibjit Singh created a chance and Sumit found himself at the perfect position inside the Pakistan circle to tap the ball in and draw level With the scores tied at 22 the fourth and final quarter produced endtoend hockey from both the teams India had the better share of chances but Pakistan too didnrsquot give up without a fight India secured two more penalty corners and this time Varun was on target to make it 32 in his sidersquos favour Three minutes from the final hooter Akashdeep scored but Pakistan responded in no time when Nadeem deflected in a long ball to reduce the marginKorea beat Japan on penalties for titleDhaka South Korea clinched the Asian Champions Trophy title after beating Japan 42 in shootout following a 33 stalemate at the end of the regulation 60 minutes of the final here on Wednesday South Korea ended the first quarter with a 10 lead then Japan led 12 at the end of the second quarter In the third quarter Japan adopted a defensive style and did not allow South Korea to score but at the same time scored one to make it 13 South Korea played aggressively in the last quarter and tied the match 33 The match was decided on a penalty shootout with South Korea controlling their nerves and winning the match 42 to win the trophy for the first timeThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever