GUANGZHOU, Nov 20 Sandeep Singh scored two goals as India stormed into the Asian Games men's hockey semi-finals with a 3-2 win over Pakistan at the Aoti Hockey field here on Saturday.

India has nine points ahead of Sunday's last league match against Japan, who are level with Pakistan on six points each.

Pakistan still has a good chance to qualify for the semis with a last group match against lowly-ranked Bangladesh.

This was Pakistan's fourth successive defeat against the arch-rivals this year. India had defeated them 4-1 at the World Cup in March, won 4-2 in the Azlan Shah Cup in Malaysia in May and hammered the rivals 7-4 at last month's Commonwealth Games.

The much-awaited game started at a brisk pace as both teams attacked each other evenly in front of a charged crowd.

India drew first blood in the second minute when Sandeep Singh's strong push beat Pakistan's defence.

Two minutes later, Rehan Butt produced the equaliser when he trapped a pass and conjured up a rare trick by deflecting the ball between his legs past the Indian goalkeeper, Bharat Kumar Chetri.

An artistic move on the left flank finally led Dharamvir Singh to finish off a beautiful field goal in the 16th minute.

The green-shirts continued piling up pressure but could not equal the score as India enjoyed 2-1 lead at the half-time.

Pakistan's Dutch coach Michel van den Heuvel kept on passing instructions loudly to his players from the stands to connect the ball and score the equaliser, but the Indian defense held its nerves and conceded just one short corner.

Pakistan came out with more purpose in the second half, attacking India using the skills of Mohammad Zubair, Fareed Ahmed, Shafqat Rasool and Mohammad Waqas.

However, Pakistan's ace forward Shakeel Abbasi was the one who levelled the score in the 43rd minute of the match by availing an accurate pass from Zubair and dodging Sandeep Singh as well as the goalie.

Pakistan continued to attack and it appeared that the green-shirts would have the better of India, but Sandeep had different ideas when he dutifully converted the third penalty-corner five minutes later to lead Pakistan yet again.

The game was not over yet and Pakistan kept on piling pressure, unfortunately no chances could be converted including a penalty-corner effort of Sohail Abbas that was easily deflected by the gloves of the jumping Indian goalkeeper.

It is pertinent to mention that few umpiring errors by New Zealands umpire S. Taylor in last few minutes went against Pakistan. He failed to notice the ball hitting foot of an Indian player with the crowd booing at him.

India had another chance in the 70th minute of the match when Sandeep Singh's push on a penalty-corner was deflected by goalkeeper Salman Akbar's pads.

Pakistan's forward-line missed three open chances as Shakeel Abbasi and Rehan Butt could not make a purposeful move past the Indian goal post.“We played attacking hockey but Pakistan also played well,” said Sandeep Singh.

Pakistan's assistant coach Khawaja Junaid also hailed the squad's performance, adding “We missed three chances and missing even a single chance in games like this, could be the only difference between victory and defeat.”

AFP adds Pakistan's coach Heuvel argued with the umpires and technical officials after the final whistle.

“Winning four times in a row does not matter, this is not a series,” said Indian captain Rajpal Singh.

“What is more important for me is that we play well in every match.

“Our strategy was simple. We had to attack from the start and not give Pakistan too many penalty-corners.”

Pakistan captain Zeeshan Ashraf blasted the umpiring, saying poor decisions throughout the match cost his team the match. He denied Pakistan would protest, but wanted his team to recover quickly from the defeat and prepare for rest of the tournament.

“We will bounce back,” the skipper concluded.

Results
Men's
Group 'B'

India 3 Pakistan 2
Japan 6 Hong Kong 1

Women's round-robin

Japan 8 Thailand 0
China 2 South Korea 2
India 6 Kazakhstan 0