India has earned the title of Asian Hockey Champions by beating Pakistan in the Asian Games final. Today both teams started aggressively and attacked each other’s goal posts.
Muhammad Rizwan from Pakistan scored a goal in the third minute of the first half and provided his team with lead which they were able to maintain till the end of first half.
Just when the second half was about to finish, Kothajeet Singh scored an equalizer goal that resulted the match to end in a tie and in order to decide the winner, a penalty shootout was carried out.
Due to poor performance of Pakistani players in the penalty shootout, India beat Pakistan by 4 goals to 2 and earned the title. As a result of this victory, India has also qualified for the 2016 Rio Olympics.
Pakistan reached final by beating Malaysia 6-5 in semifinal while India had beat South Korea by 1-0 to reach the final. Indian team reached final of this event after 12 years. Last time they won the gold medal in 1998.
Pakistan and India played 8 finals before this and 7 times Pakistan was victorious. Back in 1982 during Asian Games final, Pakistan and India played in the presence of Indian Prime Minister Indra Gandhi and thousands of spectators where Pakistan beat India by 1-7.
Pakistani team has won Hockey World Cup 4 times in 1971, 1978, 1982 and 1994 and for the first time in the history of hockey, Pakistan could not qualify for the world cup in 2014.
