India manages to held Malaysia

Dec 02: A 65th minute equaliser from striker Saba Anjum helped India to manage a 1-1 draw against Malaysia in its opening encounter of the four-nation Lal Bahadur Shastri women’s hockey tournament played at the Shivaji Stadium here on Saturday.

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The evenly balanced match saw some good moves in the first half but the hosts weren't able to convert their chances into the goal. The ball possession was principally with the Indian team but lots of mispasses and lack of control in front of rival's citadel deny them the opportunities they earned.

Though, Malaysian team mostly attacked on counters while Indian team worked its way to surge ahead. May be the Malaysians were under the awe of their 6-0 drubbing in their last meeting with the opponents.

After a barren first half Malaysian team broke the deadlock four minutes in to the second half through Norbani Hashim. Norbani gave a deft touch guiding the ball in to the net on the running ball, after receiving a nice pass from Kitu Saini.

Down with a goal Indian team launched flurry of attacks in quest of an equaliser on the other hand Malaysian players withdrew themselves to held their fort and sustain its lead. The hard efforts finally reaped benefits for Indians when Saba Anjum scored a parity goal to save the grace of her team in the dying minutes. she received a long ball on the goal line from defender Suman Bala.

"Lack of co-ordination and a lot of mispasses was somewhat that deprived us chances," Captain Mamta Kharab said after the match. Chief coach G.S. Bhangu was happy with the performance of his relatively inexperienced side. "We had the larger ball possession and we also combined well in the half-line and defence also did well to restrict opponent's strikers," opined Bhangu.

On the other hand Malaysian coach Yahya Atan was the most pleased man after the end of the match as his team snatched a crucial one point.

"My strategy was to earn a point and we managed it pretty comfortably," Yahya said after the match.

"To manage a draw in front of ample Indian crowd is really a great thing for us," he added.

Earlier, Azerbaijan comprehensively defeated Italy 4-2 to start their campaign, riding on the three second-half goals that too in a span of four-minute. The scores for Azerbaijan were Zarifahon Zeynalova, Liana Nuriyeva, Mi Kyong Aliyeva and Dilfuza Mirzaliyeva.