Hockey World Cup: Uninspired Malaysia fall 6-3 to South Africa
SINAR DAILY REPORTER26 Jan 2023 05:48pm
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Despite their higher position in the FIH world rankings (10th), the Malaysians were put on the backfoot from the start against a more eager South Africa,ranked 15th at the start of the match.
South Africa's early pressure saw them gain an eighth minute lead througha Bradley Sherwood field goal, which was doubled a minute from the start of the second quarter through a Guy Morgan penalty corner conversion and by half-time, Malaysia were down 3-0 through another field goal by Nqobile Ntuli.
Malaysia came out charging at the start of the third quarter and pulled a goal back from a Razie Rahim penalty corner conversion in the 34th minute, but Keenan Horne re-established South Africa's three-goal advantage with a field goal in the 42nd minute and a penalty stroke from Cassiem Mustapha in the 43rd minute put them firmly in the lead.
Razie then converted a penalty stroke in the 44th minute to restore some home for the Malaysians, with Firhan Ashari then bagging a 56th minute field goal to give Malaysia some hope of a fightback, before Sherwood, who started the nine-goal thriller off to a start, completed the scoring in the 56th minute.
Coach Arul Selvaraj was visibly disappointed after the match, stating he was lost for words as to what had just happened.
"I just can't put my disappointment into words. I don't know what caused this. It was like we had lost focus, did not pay attention in the first two quarters and the match was lost in the first two quarters. Nevertheless, I have to congratulate South Africa as they outplayed us and they were more capable than us today," said Arul.
Arul said one positive side of the performance was the fact that the first runner and defence of penalty corners was effective.
"Out of six penalty corners, South Africa only managed to score from one. So that is one positive out of this performance. We received just two penalty corners and we scored from one," said Arul.
Malaysia will now wait to learn of their next opponents in the 13th to 16 classification match, which will be either Japan or hosts India.
