LAHORE
Pakistan hockey captain Zeeshan Ashraf is confident that his team can end its losing streak against India and tame the arch-rivals in next month’s Asian Games at Guangzhou, China.
Pakistan and India will meet in a crucial Pool B encounter in the Asian Games hockey event on November 20. “We have to win our match against India at any cost,” Zeeshan said in an interview on Thursday. “We played badly against them in our last match but we won’t repeat the same mistakes again in Guangzhou,” said Zeeshan.
Pakistan were unable to counter India’s speed and precision and lost 4-7 in their Commonwealth Games clash in New Delhi. In a similar result, India also beat Pakistan in their World Cup clash on the same venue in March. Zeeshan said that his team won’t go down in their third meeting of the year with India.
“We won’t let Pakistan down again,” he stressed. “The match against India will be really crucial for us because it might decide which team from our pool plays South Korea in the semi-finals.”
Defending champions South Korea head Pool A that also includes hosts China, Malaysia and minnows Oman. Pakistan share Pool B with India, Japan, Bangladesh and Hong Kong.
Zeeshan said that the match against India will be Pakistan’s most important pool outing but was quick to add that his team won’t be taking Japan for granted either. “Japan are a very good team on their day and we can’t afford to take them lightly,” he said.
“We are a bit short on experience compared to India,” he said. “But the boys are improving slowly but surely.”
