India ended their campaign at the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup on a positive note with a 4-2 victory over arch-rivals Pakistan here on Sunday thanks to a brace by Rupinder Pal Singh.
With this win, India finished the tournament at the fifth spot while Pakistan had to endure the ignominy of finishing sixth and last.
The thrilling encounter saw end to end action with Pakistan drawing first blood through Muhammad Imran (7th min) before Rupinder (9th, 62nd min) restored parity a couple of minutes later.
Three goals by India in the second half from Akashdeep Singh (35th min), Malak Singh (44th min) and Rupinder sealed the issue in their favour while Kashif Shah Syed (46th min) reduced the margin for Pakistan.
Despite this win, the Indians had a somewhat mixed performance with just two victories in six matches. They started their campaign quite well with a strong performance against the Australia. Defensive errors lapse saw them concede two easy goals, leaving them 0-3 down before half-time but the Indians fought back after the break before going down 3-4.
In the second match, against South Korea, the defence was more organized, allowing very little space for the rival forwards in and around the penalty area. But defensive lapses again cost them the match. The Indians scored early in the second half before another defensive lapse allowed the Koreans to clinch the winner.
A victory against Pakistan kept them alive their hopes of going through to the knock-out stage. But a defeat against defending champions New Zealand - again due to lack of experience which led them to concede soft goals - and a draw against hosts Malaysia put paid to their chances.
They were leading 2-1 against Malaysia and were sharp in attack despite playing with 10 men for a chunk of the second half. But an error by the umpires saw them concede a penalty stroke which was converted by Faisal Saari of Malaysia.
However, India's campaign cannot be evaluated in terms of victories and losses alone. Indian coach Michael Nobbs had taken along a squad of young, inexperienced players led by Danish Mujtaba. Nobbs' primary target is to prepare a team for the 2016 Rio De Janeiro Olympics.
The biggest strong point of the current squad is fitness and a strong fighting spirit. They also have a tendency of making comebacks. In all the matches that the Indians have lost, they have made a strong comeback even after being seemingly down and out at one stage.
"Nobbs was looking at this tournament as a stepping stone towards building the team. May be that is why he had all junior players in the team. The advantage of junior players is that they have no fear of failure and there is no pressure on them. They can play freely," former Indian goalkeeper Mir Ranjan Negi told The Pioneer. "Even after conceding goals they never stopped smiling and made comebacks even from difficult situations."
"Another strong point of this team is goalkeeping. PR Sreejesh was in very good form and saved several sure shot goals," he added. "A lot of young players like Mandeep Singh who did well in the Hockey India league played well here also."
But despite playing quite well overall there are a few chinks which have to be fixed. The Indian players have been let down by a lack of experience which saw them concede easy goals.
Another weakness which cost the Indian team dear was their inability to convert penalty corners. Dragflicker Rupinder Pal Singh was markedly below par and the lack of a second penalty corner specialist was keenly felt.
"We need to improve of penalty corner conversions. We need a good dragflicker. There is no variation in the way we take penalty corners," Negi said. "The forwardline also struggled to create scoring chances on several occasions and we also need another world class striker."