Malaysia secured a hard-fought 3-2 win over Pakistan in a gripping U-18 Asia Cup encounter in Kakamigahara, Japan, as the tournament served up fast-paced action and spirited youth competition.<\/p>\n
The Malaysian side struck early and kept sustained pressure on Pakistan\u2019s defence, with Dhirish<\/strong> delivering a brace and Israf<\/strong> adding a crucial goal to build a lead that proved decisive. Malaysia\u2019s composed finishing and organised play gave them the edge for much of the contest.<\/p>\n Pakistan showed strong character as the match progressed, with Muzammil<\/strong> reducing the deficit in the 42nd minute to spark a lively comeback by the Green Shirts. In the closing moments Muhammad Farhan<\/strong> powered in a stoppage-time goal, but Pakistan fell short of an equaliser before the final whistle.<\/p>\n The U-18 Asia Cup, run under the Asian Hockey Federation from May 29 to June 6, has highlighted the rising standard of junior hockey across the continent and provided a valuable stage for emerging talent to test themselves against regional peers.<\/p>\n Looking ahead, Pakistan\u2019s junior team will refocus for its third group-stage fixture against Bangladesh on June 3, aiming to respond quickly to this narrow loss and strengthen their standing in the competition. The national side competes with the backing of Alaska Batteries and PTCL, whose support remains important for the development of Pakistan\u2019s young hockey prospects.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Malaysia beat Pakistan 3-2 in a thrilling U-18 Asia Cup match in Kakamigahara; Pakistan aims to regroup ahead of its June 3 fixture vs Bangladesh.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":19248,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[94],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19249","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pakistan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19249"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19249\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/19248"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peakpoint.pk\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}