Austria will be firing all cylinders against Malaysia in the Uttar Pradesh Hockey Junior World Cup Men, Lucknow 2016 tomorrow.
The two nations will square off in the 11-12th positions at the Major Dhyan Chand Stadium (6.30pm Malaysian time) and Indian coach Austria’s Indian coach Cedric D’Souza is counting on his players to end their foray here with a clinical finish after a case of so near yet so far in qualifying for the quarterfinals.
“I am extremely proud of this team. We came here as underdogs and gave a good performance against Argentina in our first match. We got noticed early in the tournament and that really pumped up the players,” said D’Souza, who is bracing for the Malaysian juniors to give the European side a tormenting time.
“Having watched the Malaysians play I think this match will go to the wire. It all depends on who converts the chances early in the game. But in hockey anything can happen even with two minutes of play remaining. So it’s going to be interesting,” added D’Souza.
D’Souza was obviously referring to the New Zealand-Spain Pool C encounter when the Spaniards claimed a second-place finish in dramatic circumstances – a last minute 3-3 draw against New Zealand denied the junior Black Sticks a place in the knock-out stages. New Zealand led 3-2 until Lara Rosell netted two minutes from full time to shackle the Kiwis.
Austria’s first ever appearance in a Men’s Junior World Cup has been a roller coaster so far here as they held Argentina, who reached the final of the 2013 and 2009 editions, to a 1-1 draw in pool A opening match, defeated Korea 5-2 before going down 4-2 to the Australians. They shared three-equal points with Argentina but lost out of a spot in the quarterfinals on goal difference.
But the final blow came when the Austrians suffered an ignominious 4-2 defeat in the hands of African junior continental runner-up South Africa in the 9-12 classification matches on Wednesday.
The Austrians have scored 10 goals in the tournament and five of which came from penalty corners by a side that is marshalled by three senior team players. Franz Lindengrün, Pit Rudofsky and team captain Leon Thörnblom were members of Austria’s senior side that claimed a top finish at the Hockey World League Round 1 event in Antalya, Turkey in September.
Malaysia, who accepted a late invitation to replace Pakistan, have produced some strong performances in previous editions of the Junior World Cup, having come close to a podium finish on three separate occasions.
In 2013, the team was beaten to the bronze medal by the Netherlands. The majority of the players selected competed in the recent Sultan of Johor Cup, where Malaysia finished in fifth place just six weeks ago.
Wallace Tan’s juniors lost 7-2 against the Dutch here, defeated the Egyptians 2-0 and bowed 3-0 to the Belgians in Pool B preliminary round matches before succumbing to a 3-0 loss against New Zealand in the 9-12th classifications matches on Wednesday.
Malaysian junior’s captain, Muhammad Najib Abu Hassan, however, is upbeat for the upcoming encounter against the Austrians.
“Austria has been playing well here and we will go into the match with much optimism. It’s our last chance to come clean to finish 11th here. Except for the 7-2 defeat against Netherlands, overall I think we gave a good performance despite the very late call-up by FIH,” said Najib, adding that playmaker and drag-flick specialist Syed Mohammad Syafiq Syed Cholan has not recovered from his shin injury yet.
All said and done, the Malaysians and Austrians will be hungry for another victory and return home with pride.
