Even though they missed out on featuring in the final today, Malaysia will hope to end the 28th Sultan Azlan Shah Cup with a podium finish with a win against Canada at the 3rd/4th placing match today.
Co-captain, Mohd Fitri Saari, one of the four designated captains alongside Muhammad Razie Abd Rahim, Muhammad Marhan Mohd Jalil and Meor Muhamad Azuan Hassan, wants to end the tournament on a high note as a morale booster for the Speedy Tigers next assignment, the FIH Men’s Series Final Kuala Lumpur 2019 at the end of next month.
“Our target is the World Series, we have to win it (to qualify for the Olympics). A win tomorrow is more important than today (yesterday).
“Tomorrow (today) is the fight for the bronze medal. We want to be up on the podium. If we don’t end the tournament on a high note, we will be carrying these thoughts into our next tournament.
“Overall in the campaign we played well, our biggest regret is we had loss to Korea. If we had drawn or won, capitalizing of the number of chances that we had.
“Our biggest weakness is our finishing, we have to capitalize on our chances. Just like in this game, we should have won 5-2 or 6-2, we hope to maintain this performance for tomorrow’s (today’s) game.
Meanwhile, the finale today will see the two remaining unbeaten teams, India taking on Korea.
India will be gunning for their sixth title while Korea, their third championship win. Ironically these two teams who drew 1-1 in the group stage, were declared joint winners in 2010 after bad weather forced the abandonment of their game after six minutes with the score tied at 0-0.
In the other match, Japan and Poland will meet each other in the 5th/6th place playoff.
Fixtures
Final day
30th March (Saturday)
5th/6th placing – Japan vs Poland, 4.05 pm
3rd/4th placing – Malaysia vs Canada, 6.05 pm
Final – India vs Korea, 8.35 pm
