Ipoh, 17^th May: India and Korea were declared joint champions after the cup final was abandoned a little over six minutes after start of the game in the Sultan Azlan Shah hockey tournament on Sunday. India, the defending champion, leads the pool with a tally of 13 points.

Heavy rain forced the Tournament Committee to arrive at this unprecedented decision. This is the first time that the teams have been declared joint winners in this tournament since its inception in 1983.

Even the two earlier matches, which Australia and Pakistan won, were affected by rain.The rain had abated in the second half of the Australia-Malaysia encounter. But the drizzle began when the Indian and Korean teams lined up for the national anthem. It intensified into a heavy downpour reducing the visibility of the umpires and players. The rain continued for about 30 minutes leaving the pitch inundated.

The Tournament Committee and the TD, Paul Richards, met to take stock of the situation and decided to abandon the final. It was then conveyed to Sultan Azlan Shah, President, Asian Hockey Federation, for his approval.

The 18-member strong squad took up moral responsibility for the poor show and all the players resigned later.

“Yes we have resigned. We have taken this decision voluntarily and we want now the youngsters to take over,” Rehan Butt said.

Pakistan finished last (12th) in the hockey world cup after losing the play-off match to Canada.

“It is a shameful performance that we have ended up on the last spot in the World Cup, this was something I was not expecting at all from this team,” PHF president Qasim Zia said. “Their performance is shocking, I have no words to describe what happened. But we are now looking ahead to the Asian Games,” he added.

Former players like Qamar Ibrahim, Mansoor Ahmed and Islahuddin Siddique blamed Bajwa for the team’s debacle and demanded his removal from the PHF.

“He is a disaster as the World Cup results show. The PHF President must bring in stable and good people to run hockey,” Siddique said.

Qasim Zia hinted that PHF will appoint a committee to look into what caused the debacle.

New Delhi, March 7 – Argentina has registered their first victory in the hockey World Cup, scored over New Zealand with a lone goal in the Pool A match.

In the 55th minute of the match Argentina striker Facuda Callioni scored the winning goal. However, the country is already out of semifinal race after loosing their first three matches.

With this defeat New Zealand also need to win their match against defending champion Germany in their last match on March 9 for hope for semi final. New Zealand has six points from four matches. In the game with Argentina, New Zealand got a few chances to score but all over Argentina edged over its opponent.

In the 25th minute, Argentina Martias Enrique Paredes got a chance from very close range but brilliant effort by Kiwi goalkeeper Kyle Pontifex defied any early damage. New Zealand also got a very good chance in the 32nd minute but Ryan Archibald wasted a penalty stroke.

The second half saw all out attack from both sides to get a goal which did not happen till the 55th minute.

Facundo Callioni scored the only goal of the match in the final stage of the game. New Zealand tried hard to equal the match but Argentina strong defense failed them to do so.

New Delhi, March 04 — India lost to Spain by 5-2 in the Pool B of Hockey World Cup on Thursday at Major Dhyanchand Stadium. Spain dented the semi-final berth hope of India with their spectacular win.

At the end of the first-half host India failed to score out of penalty corner and trailed Spain 0-2.

Albert Sala of Spain scored the first goal of the team in the 19th minute and gave the team an early lead.

The lead was extended when captain Pol Amat scored for Spain when it was 14 seconds to go in the first half.

In the eleventh minute of the first half Spain got a penalty corner but fail to convert it.

The two teams played fast-paced game. Francisco Cortes, Spanish goal-keeper, was able to save twice in a brilliant performance of Sandeep Singh’s penalty corner strike and Sardara Singh’s rebound shot.

Though India made few good moves but those were not in fact converted to goals.

The first goal from India was scored in the second half by star drag flicker Sandeep Singh in the 39th minute. Soon after this Spain extended lead by two goals. In the 41st minute Pau Quemada scored and Ramon Alegre in the 42nd minute.

Thursday’s defeat was the second of India in the World Cup. On Tuesday India lost to Australia by 5-2.

The opening match of India was in great fashion when it defeated archrivals Pakistan by 4-1 on Sunday.

Spain is now ranked on second place in Pool B with Australia.

New Delhi, March 02 — After the mega win of India with 4-1 against arch-rivals Pakistan, the team was thrashed by Australia by 5-2 on Tuesday in the hockey World Cup at Major Dhyan Chand Stadium.

The Australians displayed a triumphant performance by dominating the game throughout. Glenn Turner scored two goals and one goals each was scored by Liam De Young, Luke Doerner and Desmond Abbott.

From the Indian side, captain Rajpal Singh and Vikram Pillay were the scorer.

Rajpal Singh, skipper, scored the second goal when Australia were leading by 5-1 in a triumphant manner.

The 5th goal from the Australian side was scored just the next minute of the 4th goal by Glenn Turner and he made the Australian dominance more prominent. He scored in the 43rd minute, a minute after Luke Doerner scored.

Australian scored the three goals in the first-half. The third goal was scored by Desmond Abbott in the 26th minute.

In the 10th minute of the game the Australian were in a lead of 2-0 when Glenn Turner scored the second goal.

New Delhi, March 1 – India striker Shivendra Singh and Pakistan goalkeeper Irfan Muhammad suspended for three and one matches respectively for violations in the hockey World Cup.

Shivendra was accused for hitting Pakistan’s Fareed Ahmed above the eye in Sunday’s league clash between arch rivals. He was given suspension for three matches by tournament director Ken Read.

Pakistan goalkeeper Irfan Muhammad was also fined by Mr. Read for wearing unapproved glove and knee pad to defend the penalty corner, a statement from the International Hockey Federation (FIH) said.

Shivendra charged under a level 2 offence of FIH’s code of conduct. The code deals with physical attack causing serious injury. In the match between India and Pakistan he scored a goal that resulted a one sided victory to India. This suspension means he will miss India’s vital group B matches against Australia, Spain and England. However, he would be available for last match against South Africa.

Pakistan’s manager Asif Bajwa admitted that goalkeeper’s gloves and knee pad were not taken to the technical committee for approval before the tournament. It was also a technical fault deals under code of conduct. Therefore, Irfan was suspended for one match in line with the rule of Federation. Irfan will sit out of Pakistan’s match against Spain on Tuesday.

Mr. Read after watching video replays of match came into conclusion that Shivendra had hit Fareed with intent. Nevertheless, the online referees didn’t bother about the incident and not penalize the Indian striker during the match.

The 12-nation tournament in the Indian capital ends on March 13.

New Delhi, Feb. 28 — India beat Pakistan with 4-1 in the hockey World Cup on Sunday at the Major Dhyan Chand Stadium. Two goals was scored by Sandeep Singh.

The one goal of Pakistan was earned by Sohail Abbas through penalty corner in the 60th minute bringing sigh of relief.

In the first-half India managed two goals and also dominated the second-half with the third goal scored by Prabhjot Singh giving India lead of 3-0.

Sandeep Singh gave India upper hand in the first-half as he converted a penalty corner to a goal giving 2-0 lead to the team in the 35th minute.

In the 27th minute India took a lead of 1-0 when Shivendra Singh converted one penalty corner.

India and Pakistan ruled the world hockey for years, but now in shadows of their past.

Current track record of the two teams gives Pak a definite edge. In Salta Pakistan team had staggering 6-3 victory in the semi-final of Champions Challenge.

Islamabad, Feb. 27 — Sports minister of Pakistan Aijaz Hussain Jakhrani has been barred by Pakistan premier Yousuf Raza Gilani from attending hockey World Cup opening ceremony in Delhi on Sunday, reports media in Islamabad on Saturday.

Aijaz Hussain Jakhrani was scheduled to visit the country on the occasion of opening ceremony of hockey World Cup and he is also to watch the match at the Major Dhyan Chand National Stadium between India and Pakistan.

Due to the prevailing tension between the two countries and also because lack of substantive outcome in foreign secretary-level talks two days before, Gilani had stopped Jakhrani from travelling to India. Dawn news channel quoted this.

The sources also said that the prime minister had returned a proposal of seeking clearance for Jakhrani from the sports ministry.

However, no official word has been delivered yet.

Chandigarh, Feb. 20 — Another controversy mounted up for the Indian hockey on Saturday with organisers of a charity event claiming that a demand of Rs 5 crore has been made by the players to feature in the matches. However, the national team members have denied the allegation.

Member of the organiser committee of AMR foundation, Hardeep Sandhu, claimed that the players who are led by Prabhjot Singh, Deepak Thaukar and Rajpal Singh were demanding Rs 5 crore for playing the four charity matches. The matches will be of 15 minutes each and it will also feature Bollywood and TV stars.

Hardeep Sandhu said,”AMR foundation had roped in 22 players to feature in four exhibition matches with Bollywood and TV stars but when yesterday one of the representatives of the organisers handed them the flight tickets from New Delhi to Chandigarh, a group of players told they don’t want these tickets as they are not gaining anything.”

Sandhu also added, “Players said they were expecting Rs 4 to 5 crore from sponsorship. Now that not much sponsors are coming, they refused to play. The organisers are very upset as despite written agreement they are backing out.”

The allegations, however, has been rubbished by Prabhjot, Rajpal and Deepak.

Rajpal said, “This is absolutely baseless. It baffles me why organisers are making such allegations at this moment. I smell a conspiracy here. There is no demand of money, we know it is a charity match.”