Malaysia pip India 2-1 to set up title clash with Australia

Ipoh, Malaysia, May 11 (UNI) India's hopes of a revival was put on hold as Malaysian stormed into the final of the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup with a 2-1 win here today.

Malaysia qualified for the final after a lapse of 22 years. It will be the first ever Malaysia-Australia final in the series after the Oz put the South Koreans to the sword with a 6-2 win in the first semi-final.

In a pulsating semi-final match that swung from end to end the Malaysians displayed discipline and skills to match the Indians and provided the thrilling encounter which had the capacity crowd enthralled.

The Indians gave everything they had but still could not douse the fire in the confident Malaysians.

But India had their chances. Two penalty corners, numerous field attempts and they also had their drag flicker in the line-up.

India also stayed true to their attacking style with Rajpal Singh, Shiwender Singh, Prabjot Singh and Roshana Minz making forays in the D. But the Malaysian defenders having numbers behind them managed to stop them.

Malaysian national coach Sarjit Singh said their game plan was to defend in the first half and not concede the goal.

''It worked and the players played it to the letter. We got the goal we wanted and that was the spur the team needed,'' he said.

As usual the Indian coach Joaqium Carvalho disappeared after the match refusing to talk to the media. All attempts by the Indian media to try and track him down also failed. It certainly left a bad taste when he had been present at all press conferences in earlier matches.

In the match, Indian midfielder Vikram Kanth marred his good performance in the tournament with a yellow card in the 19th minute.

India can still match their podium finish of last year when the play South Korea for this place on Sunday.

In the earlier semi-final, the Australians proved too strong with their finishing touches for the Koreans to handle.

The first half was a closely fought affair with the Australians leading 2-1.

Desmond Abbott started the scoring in the ninth minute and Andrew Smith was on target in the 22nd minute. The Koreans found their goal through a penalty corner flick taken by Jeong Yun-sang in the 11th minute.

The Australians started off strongly the second half with an early goal by Liam Deyoung in the 37th minute and this was followed up with a field goal from Eli Matheson in the 51st minute.

Then Deyoung and Abbott ended the rout with their second goals in the 60th and 69th minutes respectively. The Koreans reduced the deficit through Lee Sung-min in the 57th minute but by then the fight was over for them.

Australian coach Colin Batch was happy with the performance especially the forwards who have knocked in 13 goals in two matches.

''It is always pleasing when your forwards start scoring. Our penalty corner rates are not good and we need to improve on that.

''But then when you get the goals from the field attempts naturally your penalty corners will also be less. We are looking at improving on this game and we certainly we will go all out to win the final,'' he added.

The final on Sunday will be Australia's eighth and fourth in a row. They have woth the title four times in 1983, 1998, 2004 and 2005.

MALAYSIA: S. Kumar, Chua Boon Huat, Mohamed Shukri Mutalib, Megat Azrafiq, Jiwa Mohan, Engku Abdul Malek, Azlan Misron, Zulkifli Rejab, Kelvinder Singh, Ismail Abu, Jivan Mohan.

Reserves: Khairul Nizam, Tengku Ahmad Tajuddin, Mohamed Shahrun Nabil, S. Selvaraju, Mohamed Razie.

INDIA: Baljit Singh, Harpal Singh, Rajpal Singh, Prabodh Tirkey, V.

Raghunath, Bimal Lakra, William Xalxo, Sardar Singh, Vikran Kanth, Tushar Khandkar, Prabhjot Singh.

Reserves: Bharat Kumar, Shivender Singh, Didar Singh, Bharat Chikkara, Roshnan Minz.

UNI