With India and Pakistan set to clash in the final league match of the Asian Hockey Champions Trophy 2023, it will arguably be the match of the tournament. While India sit pretty at the top and have sealed a semi-final berth, Pakistan will be a far from an easy prospect. With Pakistan opening their account in the competition with a win over China, they will only hope to go ahead more.
While India remain unbeaten with three victories in the tournament, they must avoid complacency and errors to keep their arch-rivals at bay. Nevertheless, it's worth noting that recent history is overwhelmingly skewed towards India. Pakistan's last win over India came way back in 2016, with the latter's side still at the developmental stages. Since then, the Men in Green have won 12 times in 14 meetings, alongside a couple of draws.
Strengths of India and Pakistan leading up to the clash:
India's greatest advantages will be its better experience and fitness. To ensure that superiority on paper translates into dominance on the pitch, the players must adhere to their game plan and play with their heads rather than their hearts.
While Umar Bhutta in the midfield and Mohammad Sufiyan in the back have shown promise, players like Abdul Rana and Abdul Hannan Shahid might be dangerous for the Indian defence. The Indian defence will need to be watchful in order to prevent PCs because Pakistan has a history of getting out to an aggressive start and creating chances early.
What the two sides said:
"India is not playing structural hockey, but Pakistan is. India is simply playing over fitness. Structural hockey is played by Korea and Japan. India has been playing behind the ball mostly and relying mainly on counter-attacking" - Muhammad Saqlain.
"Matches are important for any team. If we play more matches together, it will surely help us and Asian hockey as a whole. But, it all depends on the situation, and I feel we should play a lot more against each other" - Indian skipper Harmanpreet Singh.
