ACT Rest Day: India Have the Title in Sight, Harmanpreet Has the Golden Stick Race, and Wednesday Is Two Rematches
Tuesday is the quiet day at the Asian Champions Trophy, and India will be enjoying the silence. The tournament has moved from Jalandhar to Mohali, the league stage is done, and the hosts are exactly where they wanted to be: five wins from five, 15 points, 34 goals scored and just five conceded.
The scoring race has a clear leader too. Captain Harmanpreet Singh tops the charts on nine goals, and he has done it when it mattered, including the hat-trick against Malaysia that turned the toughest league game of India’s week. India don’t just lead the table, they lead the individual race as well, and that double is why they are favourites now.
Wednesday in Mohali is two rematches, and both of them are fascinating for different reasons. Wednesday’s Mohali card, in Pakistan time: China v Bangladesh for fifth place at 1:30pm, Japan v Malaysia at 4:00pm, India v South Korea at 6:30pm. India meet South Korea again, two days after beating them 8-0 in Jalandhar. Korea still finished fourth on six points, so they are in the semi-finals on merit, but they have to find something completely different against a side that just put eight past them. The other semi-final is Japan against Malaysia, a repeat of Monday’s 2-1 win for Japan that sealed second place on 10 points, ahead of Malaysia on nine. Japan don’t blow teams away, they finished the league stage with a goal difference of exactly zero, nine scored and nine conceded, but they keep winning the close ones. Malaysia know they can live with them. They just couldn’t finish them off on Monday.
Before the semi-finals, China and Bangladesh meet again for fifth place, after their 1-1 draw in Monday’s opener left China fifth on two points and Bangladesh sixth on one. And on Thursday, the bronze medal match and the final decide the medals.
Rest days are for recovery, but they are also for thinking. Korea have two days to work out how to survive India. Malaysia have two days to work out how to beat Japan. India have two days to enjoy being unbeaten, and to make sure Wednesday doesn’t become the day it all unravelled.
