Looks like the athletes in Pakistan have a knack for beating New Zealand whatever the sport may be. The men’s cricket team beat NZ in the World Cup, earlier this week women in green created history by beating women in black for the first time in T20, and now the men in the junior hockey team have beaten black ferns in the ongoing World Cup. The Junior Hockey World Cup commenced on 5th December 2023 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Let’s take a look at how Team Pakistan is doing and what the scorecard looks like for the other participants.
Interesting to read: Junior Hockey World Cup complete schedule
Green Team Off to a Dream Start:
Pakistan was once the king of hockey having won four World Cups. Then they suffered a downfall so severe that the team hasn’t been able to qualify for the World Cups. The sport has suffered a lot at the hands of corrupt PHF officials. In this Junior World Cup, Pakistan started its campaign with a draw against the mighty Netherlands 3-3 and now has defeated Black Sticks ( New Zealand) 4-0 giving Pakistan a huge advantage as now Pakistan only needs a draw to confirm its qualification against Belgium on 9th December 2023. The chances of Pakistan qualifying look very real now.
Junior Hockey World Cup 2023
16 teams were divided into four groups with two teams to be qualifying for Quarter Finals. All the teams have Completed their two games of round-robin league matches with now only one match being left things are starting to shape and get cleared what does the team require?
Group A
| Teams | Played | Won | Loss | GD | Points |
| Argentina | 2 | 2 | 0 | 5 | 6 |
| Australia | 2 | 1 | 1 | 5 | 3 |
| Malaysia | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Chile | 2 | 0 | 2 | -12 | 0 |
Argentina the defending champions have already qualified for the Top eight whereas there is competition between Australia and Malaysia for the 2nd spot to be filled.
Group B
| Teams | Played | Won | Loss | GD | Points |
| France | 2 | 2 | 0 | 4 | 6 |
| Germany | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 3 |
| South Africa | 2 | 1 | 1 | -1 | 3 |
| Egypt | 2 | 0 | 2 | -3 | 0 |
Similarly in this group, it is shocking to see a team as big as Germany defeated by a resurgent team France where hockey has started to put firm feet in the game of Hockey. There is competition between South Africa and Germany as there is not much difference in goals between them. So it would be interesting to see what happens in the next round of matches set to be played tomorrow.
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Group C
| Teams | Played | Won | Loss | GD | Points |
| Spain | 2 | 2 | 0 | 10 | 6 |
| Korea | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 |
| India | 2 | 1 | 1 | -1 | 3 |
| Canada | 2 | 0 | 2 | -10 | 0 |
This group is certainly alive and kicking and there is still a lot of potential fight for the 2nd place in the group is still up for grasp between the two big teams as we go down to the final day showdown of the group. It would be interesting to see how things pan out as Korea has an uphill task to beat Spain who defeated India 4-1 in the Group stage and India will have a slightly easier opponent in Canada who hasn’t been in the greatest form as yet.
Group D
| Teams | Played | Won | Loss | Tie | GD | Points |
| Pakistan | 2 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 4 |
| Netherland | 2 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 4 |
| Belgium | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 3 |
| New Zealand | 2 | 0 | 2 | 0 | -8 | 0 |
This group has been the group of death as all four teams are bigger teams and that is why this group has lived up to his hype after two rounds of round-robin league matches is not confirmed which teams will qualify for the next round all is on the matches to be played on 9th December 2023 but right now Green shirts are at top of their group after their amazing performance against the Netherlands to hold them for 3-3 draw and now Pakistan won their match against New Zealand by a big margin has made Pakistan’s chances are very much higher even if Pakistan manages a draw against Belgium they will qualify and Belgium will exit as the Netherlands will have the match against Black Sticks who can cause upset on their given day this group is evenly poised for the end.
Bright Chances for Pakistan:
In the junior Hockey World Cup, the chances of the green sticks have certainly increased after their brilliant performance against the bigger nations given the facility there is at their disposal this surely gives us hope that the sport of hockey will rise again.
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