| Pak keep semis hope alive
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Chennai
September 3, 2007
Pakistan 8 Singapore 0
Three-time Asia Cup Champion Pakistan kept their hopes alive for a semi-final
berth here at the 2007 Asia Cup championship beating Singapore 8-0 on Monday.
Pakistan who are experimenting and trying to regroup as a team, after losing to
Japan 1-3, were not very fluent against Singapore. Pakistan missed open goal
chances and even their penalty corner variations and direct flicks were not on
target. Pakistan did win 8-0 but the score-line could easily have been double of
that.
Muhammad Imran opened the scoring in the 4th minute off a penalty corner
conversion and the former champions seemed on their way to amassing a huge
score.
But the Singapore goalkeeper Lim Shi Paul, who won the man-of-the-match, kept
the Pakistani’s away. Time and again, he charged out to effect saves and even
saved off the line.
Pakistan’s famed forward-line with players like Rehan Butt and Shakeel Abassi
couldn’t play in tandem. And that was most worrying for coach Islahuddin, former
captain and now coach.
“We are still trying to forge combinations and trying to experiment before the
Beijing Olympics comes on our head,” said Islahuddin. “I am confident that we
would improve and these matches are a good eye-opener.”
Score Sheet:
Muhammad Imran (4th, PC) 1-0
Abbas Haider (23rd, FG) 2-0
Tariq Aziz (25th, FG) 3-0
Abbas Haider (27th, FG) 4-0
Ihsan Ullah (40th, PC) 5-0
Imran Khan (63rd, PC) 6-0
Rehan Butt (67th, FG) 7-0
Rehan Butt (70th, FG) 8-0
| Schedule |
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Final Standings :
1. India
2. S Korea
3. Malaysia
4. Japan
5. China
6. Pakistan
7. Bangladesh
8. Hong Kong
9. Sri Lanka
10. Singapore
11. Thailand
Sunday's Matches  |
|||||||
| TEAM A | TEAM B | Playoff | TIME | RESULT | |||
| S Lanka | SPore | 9/10 | 08:00 | 6-0 | |||
| Ban | HKG | 7/8 | 07:00 | 3-1 | |||
| China | Pak | 5/6 | 09:30 | 3-2 | |||
| Malaysia | Japan | 3/4 | 16:00 | 5-3 | |||
| India | S Korea | 1/2 | 18:30 | 7-2 | |||
|
Saturday's Matches |
|||||||
| TEAM A | v | TEAM B | TIME | RESULT | |||
| Singapore | v | Thailand | 08:00 | 4-0 | |||
| Pak | v | Ban | 07:00 | 10-0 | |||
| China | v | HongKong | 09:30 | 6-1 | |||
| S Korea | v | Malaysia | 17:00 | 2-1 | |||
| India | v | Japan | 19:30 | 4-1 | |||
|
SCORE TABLE |
|||||||
| POOL A | |||||||
| TEAM | P | W | D | L | GF | GA | PTS |
| Malaysia SF | 4 | 3 | 1 | 26 | 4 | 10 | |
| Japan SF | 4 | 3 | 1 | 18 | 4 | 9 | |
| Pakistan | 4 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 18 | 7 | 7 |
| Hong Kong | 4 | 1 | 3 | 6 | 28 | 3 | |
| Singapore | 4 | 4 | 2 | 27 | 0 | ||
| POOL B | |||||||
| TEAM | P | W | D | L | GF | GA | PTS |
| India SF | 5 | 5 | 46 | 2 | 15 | ||
| S Korea SF | 5 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 41 | 8 | 10 |
| China | 5 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 32 | 6 | 10 |
| Bangladesh | 5 | 2 | 3 | 16 | 22 | 6 | |
| Sri Lanka | 5 | 1 | 4 | 15 | 46 | 3 | |
| Thailand | 5 | 5 | 1 | 67 | 0 | ||
 |
 A team should be ready to play anyone. Of course, more |
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