ACT 2026: India’s Hat-Trick, Harmanpreet’s 10 Goals, and the Final Standings

India didn’t just win this Asian Champions Trophy. They owned it from the first night to the last.

Seven games, seven wins, 46 goals scored and seven conceded. A 13-0 opening win over Bangladesh, a 4-1 win over Japan in the league stage, an 8-1 semi-final win over Korea, and then a 4-1 win over Japan again in Thursday’s final in Mohali. The sixth title, and a third in a row after 2023 and 2024. Nobody in Asia is close to this team right now.

The final standings tell the story plainly enough. India champions, Japan runners-up, Malaysia third after their 5-2 bronze-medal win over Korea, Korea fourth, China fifth and Bangladesh sixth. Twenty matches produced 107 goals at 5.35 a game, and India scored 46 of them.

Harmanpreet Singh finished as the tournament’s top scorer with 10 goals. His 250th international goal came in the semi-final against Korea, and he passed Balbir Singh Sr’s tally of 246 along the way, which makes him India’s second-highest scorer of all time behind Dhyan Chand. Not a bad week for the captain.

Behind him, Dilpreet Singh and Malaysia’s Abu Kamal Azrai finished on seven each. Azrai’s two goals in the bronze-medal match were the difference for Malaysia, and they capped a tournament where he was his team’s most reliable finisher. Sukhjeet Singh scored six, Shilanand Lakra five, and the list of four-goal men reads like a roll call of the tournament’s best attackers: China’s Benhai Chen, India’s Jugraj Singh and Malaysia’s Akhimullah Anuar.

Japan leave with a third runners-up finish, after 2013 and 2021, and that’s the hard part of this tournament to swallow. They were superb in the semi-final, holding Malaysia scoreless for an hour and winning the shootout 5-3, and they led the final for 42 minutes. But they scored nine goals in the league stage and conceded nine, and against India’s attack that margin for error was never going to be enough.

Korea’s week fell apart at the end. They lost their last three games: 8-0 to India in the league stage, 8-1 to the same side in the semi-final, and 2-5 to Malaysia in the bronze-medal match. Champions in 2021, fourth now, and with a lot to think about.

China took fifth by beating Bangladesh 3-1 in Wednesday’s classification game, and Bangladesh finished sixth with a single point from five games. Bangladesh were only in the tournament because Pakistan withdrew before it started, with the PHF citing security concerns. Punjab hosted for the first time, with the league stage in Jalandhar and the knockouts in Mohali, and admission was free all week.

What comes next is a quick turnaround. The Pro League starts on 8 December and Craig Fulton has already said a new-look squad will be picked for it, with an eye on LA 2028. Before that, the women’s Asian Champions Trophy starts in Bhopal on 19 November, with India opening against Malaysia. Punjab’s fortnight is done. The season doesn’t slow down.