India lose to Malaysia, fail to enter final
Gabriel Jesus’s return has come at a good time for Man City as they seek to move closer to Champions League qualification by beating Crystal Palace at home on Saturday.
The Brazil striker, 20, has made two appearances since recovering from a broken foot sustained at Bournemouth in February. Having seen a goal disallowed in a 0-0 draw against Manchester United, he grabbed a late equaliser in a 2-2 draw at Middlesbrough last weekend after being promoted from the bench to the starting line-up.
With Sergio Aguero struggling to recover from a groin problem, there is every chance that Jesus will start again on Saturday as City look to consolidate their top-four position.
They are just one point clear of fifth-place Manchester United, who visit out-of-form Arsenal on Sunday, and manager Pep Guardiola knows there is little room for error with only four league matches to play.
Guardiola’s season has hit trouble lately, with those two league draws following an FA Cup semifinal defeat against Arsenal. Indeed, City have won just two of their last eight matches in all competitions.
It has been a tough first year in England for Guardiola, who will finish a season without a trophy for the first time in his coaching career. But whatever the next few weeks bring for City, captain Vincent Kompany believes the club are heading in the right direction.
“Finish strongly now and we give ourselves something to look forward to next season because you want to be in four competitions,” Kompany said.
“Sometimes exceptional seasons are built on seasons like this. The mood’s not great because we are at that time in the season where we need to win games and it didn’t happen on Sunday (at Boro). Now it’s a case of having to finish the last four games really strongly.”
A listless India slumped to a heart-breaking 0-1 defeat to hosts Malaysia in their last league match as they failed to reach the final of Sultan Azlan Shah Cup hockey tournament for the second consecutive year here today.
Needing to win by a two-goal margin to make the final after Great Britain had edged past New Zealand 3-2 earlier in the day, India failed to produce a cohesive game and suffered their second loss of the tournament.
Finishing with seven points from five matches, India will on Saturday play New Zealand in the play-off for the bronze medal,
In the day of the underdogs, World No. 16 Japan pulled off a most stunning upset with a 3-2 victory over reigning world champions Australia.
Koji Yamasaki’s two late goals (56th and 57th minutes)
while the title encounter will be between defending champions Australia and Great Britain.
An Indian victory by two goals would have pushed the British were the feature of Japan’s stupendous victory over Australia after Shota Yamada (44th minute) started the fightback with a penalty corner conversion.
Australia’s earlier strikes by Jeremy Edwards (seventh minute) and Trent Mitton (31st) were not enough against the rank outsiders.
team to the bronze medal game, but Malaysia turned the tables on India who gave a disjointed exhibition of hockey.
Malaysia opened the scoring in the 50th minute with a penalty corner conversion through Shahril Saabah’s drag-flick to the right of the goalkeeper.
Video referrals seemed to be the flavour of the game as it was taken several times in penalty corner actions. India were successful with video referral once but then lost one too. They showed more purpose in the second half, but their attack was not cohesive and the strikers turned out to be error-prone after reaching the top of the circle.
Going all out in search of goals, India made three forays into the rival circle in the last four minutes and even earned two penalty corners, but the Malaysians stoutly defended their citadel.