HANGZHOU: For 30 minutes at the Gongshu Canal Sports Park Stadium, Pakistan huffed and puffed for a goal but it would not come.

The Japanese defence would prove too much to breach and by the end of it all, Pakistan would end up losing 3-2 — with all the goals coming in the first half — on Monday to crash out of medal contention in the men’s hockey event at the Asian Games.

The equation was simple: Pakistan needed to win their final Pool ‘A’ fixture for a top-two finish and a place in the semi-finals with a berth at next year’s Olympics in Paris on offer for the eventual gold medallists at the Games.

Pakistan would now have to fight it out at qualifying tournaments in order to avoid missing out on a third-straight Olympics.

But after their 10-2 mauling at the hands of arch-rivals India on Saturday, Pakistan did show some early promise and took the lead through Arshad Liaquat’s field goal in the fifth.

The lead, though, lasted merely a minute with Japan levelling matters through Kaito Tanaka’s penalty corner conversion before taking the lead in the 17th when Kentaro Fukuda scored a field goal.

Japan made it 3-1 in the 28th through Raiki Fujishima’s brilliantly-executed drag-flick but Arbaz Ahmed revived Pakistan’s hopes when he netted in similar fashion at the hooter of the second quarter.

However, the goal Pakistan hoped would spark a comeback proved elusive and they will now face Malaysia in the fifth-place game on Friday.

KABADDI, SQUASH DEFEATS

It was day of gloom elsewhere too for Pakistan at the Games with the men’s kabaddi team falling 43-16 to Iran in their opening Group ‘B’ game at the XSG Sports Centre.

Over at the squash courts, things didn’t get any better with Mohammad Asim Khan and Nasir Iqbal — members of the men’s team which won silver — falling in the last 16 of the singles competition while Noor-ul-Ain Ijaz and Noor-ul-Huda Sadiq exited the women’s singles event at the same stage.

Asim fought a 66-minute battle with Abdullah Almezayan of Kuwait before losing 4-11, 11-1, 8-11, 11-8, 4-11 while Nasir was dispatched 9-11, 8-11, 6-11 by Qatar’s Abdulla Altamimi.

Noor-ul-Ain was undone by Malaysian Sivasangari Subramaniam 3-11, 2-11, 1-11 while Lok Tze Ho of Hong Kong accounted for Noor-ul-Huda 11-2, 11-4, 11-5.

The mixed doubles team of Farhan Zaman and Sadia Gul won one and lost one match in Pool ‘D’ while in the duo of Noor Zaman and Mehwish Iqbal lost their match against Japanese opposition in Pool ‘A’.

There was some joy for Pakistan at the badminton court where Murad Ali and Irfan Saeed Bhatti advanced to the last 16 of men’s doubles with a 21-18, 21-14 win over Erdenebayar Enkhbold and Enkhbat Olonbayar of Mongolia but Ghazala Siddique lost her round-of-64 clash against Wei Jin Goh of Malaysia.

Archers Mohammad Nadeem and Israr-ul-Haq both exited the men’s recurve competition by losing their last-32 matches while Nighat Naheed fell out of the women’s contest at the same stage.

SHAROZ LEAPS INTO FINAL

Pakistan had a bright start to the day in the morning session of track and field at the Hangzhou Olympic Stadium when Sharoz Khan qualified for the high jump final.

Sharoz cleared the bar at 2.10m for a personal best, finishing seventh in his heat, and — with the top 12 performers qualifying for the final — went through thanks to his lesser number of attempts on the mark than Hong Kong’s John Michael Kennelly.

Leading the field was Qatar’s Olympic and world champion Mutaz Barshim, who cleared 2.19m.

Pakistan’s Waqas Akbar clocked a season-best of 1:52.99 in his men’s 800m heat but failed to qualify for the final while Abid Razzaq’s time of 51.51 seconds in his men’s 400m hurdles heat was also not enough to take him through.

Published in Dawn, October 3rd, 2023