India, Pak share honours in Asia Cup opener, colts show need for fine-tuning

Jakarta: India-Pakistan hockey matches are always robust encounters, full of adrenalin, eye-catching individual skill and end-to-end action. But given the generally callow nature of both teams at the Asia Cup and lack of coordination among the two units, it had to be expected that the marquee contest wouldn’t rise to any great heights.

It didn’t look like a high-voltage fixture between two teams who have won the continental title six times between them.

India has had the upper hand in almost all the recent encounters. In that context, a 1-1 result against the traditional rivals would have been considered a bit of a disappointment. But with nothing tangible riding on the tournament for the Tokyo Olympics bronze medalists (spots are up for grabs for the next World Cup, but India qualifies automatically as hosts), they can afford to look at the bigger picture.

SV Sunil and Birendra Lakra were the tenuous links with Indian teams of the recent past with the rest almost exclusively made up of Junior World Cup winners and second-string reserves. Most of India’s best chances came from penalty corners, but they had only one conversion to show for them – Karti Selvam’s drag flick getting a deflection off Pakistan defender Muhammad Abdullah’s stick, thus wrongfooting custodian Akmal Hussain in the first quarter.