SYDNEY, April 24: Australia finished the round-robin matches at the head of the leader board in the mens field hockey 4-Nations Challenge, beating Malaysia 5-1 on Saturday.
Malaysia and Australia meet again in the final on Sunday.
Australia got off to a good start but cruised for 15 minutes after Andrew Smith scored their second goal 10 minutes into the first half.
However Colin Batch, Australias coach, made a number of substitutions to get what was arguably his best team on to the pitch and inject some life into Australia.
Five shots on goal in the last 10 minutes of the first half produced a second goal by Australias Adam Commens.
Malaysias goalkeeper Roslan Jamaluddin saved a total of nine powerful shots in the half (16 in the match) and a penalty corner conversion attempt by Troy Elder high to Roslans left which he gloved away.
Australias Jamie Dwyer and Michael Boyce put in a goal each in the first three minutes of the second half through defensive errors by Malaysia.
Malaysia's only goal and the last score of the match came when when Boon Huat Chua cut through Australias defence, beating Bevan George on a fast break along the right, then passed to the centre of the circle for Mohammad Rodhanizam Mat Radzi to dive and deflect into goal.
"We could not maintain the quality of our play today," Batch said.
"We started to pass the ball slowly which put the receiver under pressure," Batch added.
Meanwhile India moved to third in the table with a hard-fought 4-3 victory over South Africa. The two teams will play off for third and fourth place on Sunday.
India hit two goals in four minutes to lead 4-2 with six minutes to go. But a South African goal two minutes from time gave them some anxious moments.
"The worrying thing is we are missing a lot of chances because my main forward line is missing a lot of goals," said India's coach Rajinder Singh.
South African coach Paul Revington said his team would have to stop conceding stop goals.
"We made them India work hard to win but it was disappointing to concede two soft goals out of the four goals. For a young group like this, they have to learn to stop those goals," Revington said.-AFP
