Fab four for India!

India defender Amit Rohidas is tackled by a Korean player during their Asian Champions Trophy match in China yesterday. Pic/Hockey India

Skipper Harmanpreet Singh scored a brace as defending champions India beat Korea 3-1 to register their fourth consecutive win at the Hero Asian Champions Trophy here on Thursday.

Paris Olympics bronze medallist India had defeated China 3-0, Japan 5-0 before thrashing last year's runner-up Malaysia 8-1. Already assured of a semi-final berth, India will play arch-rivals Pakistan on Saturday in their last league match in the six-team competition.

Also Read: Alcaraz's Spain off the mark in Davis Cup opener

Harmanpreet Singh

The top four teams from the league stages will qualify for the semi-finals scheduled on Monday, while the final will be played next Tuesday.

India continued their fine form and struck twice early in the first quarter to take a 2-0 lead. Araijeet Singh Hundal, who scored a brace against Malaysia, scored the first goal in the eighth minute before Harmanpreet, regarded as one of the world's best dragflickers, converted two penalty corners in the ninth and 43rd minutes.

Also Read: Duleep Trophy: Shams Mulani's unbeaten 88 run-knock saves the day for India A

Mumbai-based India goalkeeper Suraj Karkera gets the Hero of the match award. Pic/Hockey India

Korea's lone goal was scored by Jihun Yang in the 30th minute from a penalty corner. As has been the case in the tournament so far, the Indians started on an aggressive note with Araijeet handing his side the lead with a brilliant strike after being fed by Sukhjeet Singh.

A minute later, the promising Raj Kumar Pal, who struck a hat-trick against Malaysia on Wednesday, earned a penalty corner for India and captain Harmanpreet converted the chance with a powerful dragflick. India's reserve goalkeeper Suraj Karkera was impressive under the bar, denying Korea on a few occasions in the second quarter.

After an impressive first quarter, the Indians seemed to have gone into a shell in the next 15 minutes as Korea dominated the proceedings with continuous forays on the rival citadel. The Indian defence stood tall until Korea pulled a goal just at the stroke of half-time through Yang whose effort went into the net after getting a deflection from Manpreet Singh's stick from a penalty corner opportunity.

200
No of career goals scored by India's Harmanpreet Singh

This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed, agencies. Mid-day accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability, trustworthiness, reliability and data of the text. Mid-day management/mid-day.com reserves the sole right to alter, delete or remove (without notice) the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever