A dominant Pakistan continued to reign supreme in the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup (SAS Cup) as the men in green shirts registered a 4-0 victory over South Korea in Ipoh today.
Ranked 15th in the world, Pakistan share six equal points with Japan after two matches and top the table standings on a better goal average.
Pakistan’s hockey development programme is widely known to unearth raw talent and one such player is Abdul Hanan Shahid who never stopped mesmerising oppositions. The Koreans became the latest victims to experience the brunt of Hannan and Pakistan.
The 19-year-old Hannan, who received the Emerging Player Award in the Asian Champions Trophy tournament which was held in Chennai, India last year, stroked Pakistan’s opening goal three minutes into the match with a dashing run down the 25-yard line, stormed into the semi-circle with six defenders hot on his heels before flicking the ball to the right of goalkeeper Kim Jaehyeon and into the net.
It was one of the most thrilling showmanship by a skillful player in the two-day-old SAS Cup tournament and deservingly was awarded the man of the match.
The Koreans, who went down 1-2 against Japan in their opening match on Saturday (May 4), earned a total of six penalty corners and failed in all attempts while Pakistan had five and scored one.
Three-time SAS Cup champions Korea’s defensive wall further crumbled as Pakistan continued to pound them with two field goals – Arshad Liaqat (20th min) and Ghazanfar Ali (27th) to go 3-0 ahead at the breather.
The Pakistanis remained in command of the game in the second half with some outstanding attacking performance and converted a penalty corner through Sufyan Khan to end their challenge with a 4-0 victory.
PAKISTAN: ROELANT OLTMANS (COACH)
“There is no doubt we played a much better game today than against Malaysia yesterday. It took us only three minutes into the match to score the first goal.
Today the team was in better control of the match. We have also worked on improving on the mistakes made against Malaysia earlier and you can see the team was in a much better position and commanding also.
We also did some analysis before the match against Korea and there was a team effort too in our planning.”
MAN OF THE MATCH: HANNAN SHAHID (PAKISTAN)
“The goal that I scored was a team effort. I would not have scored if not for the collective support from my teammates. Our mission here is to play good hockey and our game has improved after the match against Malaysia. We will continue to play
SOUTH KOREA: TAESEOK MIN (COACH)
“Pakistan is a strong team and we did our best to keep their forwards from scoring. They are very fast, have good speed and very skillful. Our team need more time to develop. We made a lot of mistakes, and need more experience.
Korea also has many new players and we are in the process of developing this team. Our penalty corners are also not working ad we need more time to work on it.”
