The second action of the round robin, Men’s Field Hockey event, Cambodia SEA Games 2023 which took place at the Morodok Techo National Stadium, today, saw the national camp successfully close the match with 3 points after beating Singapore 4-3.
The victory also put Malaysia at the top after two matches with a total of six points followed by Indonesia with four points in second place and Thailand in third place with three points.
The four goals scored by the national team in the meeting with Singapore today were the result of three penalty corner goals and one field move goal while the three goals scored by Singapore were the result of two penalty corner goals and one field move goal.
Malaysia scored a few seconds before the end of the first quarter when the national camp was rewarded with a penalty corner and Muhammad Amirul Hamizan Azahar’s goal in the 15th minute remained until the end of the first half.
Continuing the third quarter, Singapore was seen trying to close the goal gap through a penalty corner goal completed by Noor Silas but two minutes before the end of the third quarter, Malaysia’s penalty corner advantage was translated into a goal by Alfarico Lance Liau Jr to make the score 2-1 .
As soon as the fourth quarter continued, Singapore once again scored an equalizing goal this time thanks to Dineshraj Naidu’s field movement but the goal was quickly erased by Muhammad Amirul Hamizan Azahar who once again completed the penalty corner advantage, a few seconds after Singapore scored.
Singapore changed the position to 3-3 in the 53rd minute when another penalty corner they had was translated into a goal by Noor Silas, but in the 57th minute, Muhammad Najib Abu Hassan came to the rescue of the country when he scored a field goal and the position was 4- 3 on Malaysia’s side to close the match.
The Head Coach of the National Men’s SEA Sports Team, Muhamad Amin Rahim expressed his dissatisfaction behind today’s victory by describing his men as not playing at their true performance level in addition to making some simple mistakes which caused the opposing team to dominate the game and they were in pressure.
“Praise must still be given for today’s win and I hope the players will do individual analysis to improve their performances.
“Once again, two goals through a penalty corner were a bit unsatisfactory, but the players still managed to score.
“We too easily allowed the opposition to get a penalty corner and they scored from that advantage. What I see, our discipline when defending needs to be improved and we need to focus more on defending.
“Ahead of the meeting with Thailand, they are not an easy opponent because they have a good game structure and we need to be smarter to play with them and not repeat the same mistakes as the two games we have gone through. I believe we can record a victory with Thailand,” he explained.
Tomorrow is a day of rest for the National Men’s Squad and they will play against Thailand on Saturday (May 13) at 9:00 am (Malaysian time).
