Sultan of Johor Cup: Malaysia Champions!

CAPTAIN marvel Noor Faeez Ibrahim rallied his men to lift the inaugural Sultan of Johor Cup when he scored a brace to beat Austraalia 3-2 in extra-time at the Taman Daya Stadium in Johor Baru yesterday.
Australia took the lead, but Fitri Saari closed the gap, only to see the Aussies re-gained the lead.
But Noor Faeez first struck in the 69th minute to equalise, and then scored the golden goal to send the 8,000 crowd into wild celebrations.
Both teams started nervously, as expected in a junior final, but when Australia scored in the 11th minute, the match turned into an exciting battle for the inaugural title.
Australia struck as the Malaysian defenders backtracked and allowed Wotherspoon to run into the semi circle unchecked and slot in the ball past goalkeeper Hazrul Faiz.
The capacity crowd, which had filled the stadium since 6pm, suddenly went mute, and there was pin drop silence in the stadium.
Malaysia then bungled two sitters and two penalty corners in the remaining minutes, while Australia also had a fair share of shots at goal, but heroic saves by Hazrul kept the hosts in the picture going into the breather.
The second hald again saw Malaysia missing a handful of sitters, but the strikers started to make inroads, and Australia looked like they were in for a surprise.
And the moment came in the 43rd minute, when Fitri Saari, the brother of senior striker Faizal, nailed the equaliser.
It was a clasic goal, as Fitri took matters into his own hands and dribbled into the semi-circle, and just as he stepped inside, he unleashed a reverse-stick shot which sent the ball crashing into the net and crowd into wild celebrations.
But Australia almost doused the comeback in the 59th minute, and this time the Down Under hero was Jack Wallace.
However, Malaysian skipper Noor Faeez refused to give up, and scored the 2-2 equaliser off a penalty corner in the 69th minute to take the match into sudden-death extra-time.
And Noor Faeez he again delivered in the third minute of the sudden-death, to hand Malaysia the inaugural title on a 3-2 score.
In the bronze battle, South Korea had to dig deep into their reserves to beat India on a golden goal.
The match ended 3-3, after Korea bungled a penalty stroke won 50 seconds from regulation time, when Yang Ji Hun's attempt was saved by goalkeeper Harmanpreet Singh.
But Ji Hun made amends to score the golden goal when Korea were awarded a penalty corner 40 seconds before the end of the first half of extra time.
Pakistan ended fifth when they beat New Zealand 2-0 with goals from Muhammad Dilber (31st) and Muhammad Umair (40th). In the preliminary stage New Zealand had beaten Pakistan 1-0.
TODAY: Final -- Malaysia 2 Australia 2 (Malaysia win on sudden-death goal); Third-Fourth: South Korea 3 India 3 (Korea win on golden goal); Fifth-Sixth: Pakistan 2 New Zealand 0.