Sunday, August 3, 2014

End to misery

By Vijesh Rai
 
THE men’s hockey team ended their sorry Commonwealth Games campaign with a win after beating Scotland 2-1 on Friday to finish seventh.
Victory was a pleasant surprise, not only because of the shock loss to Trinidad & Tobago and the heavy defeats at the hands of England and New Zealand, but also because Malaysia had been beaten 5-1 by Scotland in a friendly prior to the Games.
The squad leave for home tomorrow with coach K. Dharmaraj’s future under a cloud of doubt following the team’s 4-2 defeat to Trinidad.
The men emulated the Malaysian women team’s seventh placed finish, “achieved” after a 3-0 win on penalties over Canada in their classification match on Thursday.
The match had ended 2-2, the first goals Malaysia scored after a goalless group stage.