(MENAFN- Muscat Daily) Oman was dealt a 0-7 drubbing by India as the sultanate side suffered its second successive defeat in the hockey competition of the 17th Asian Games in Incheon South Korea on Tuesday.
India seeking its first Asiad gold medal since 1998 converted five penalty-corners and a penalty stroke in the one-sided Pool B game but wasted several scoring opportunities.
The big win for India came ahead of its clash against Pakistan on Thursday which could decide on the winner from the group. Against Oman India's drag-flick specialist V R Raghunath missed as many as eight penalty-corners while Rupinder Pal Singh sustained a serious thigh injury. Rupinder (18th 19th minutes) successfully converted two penalty-corners though before limping off the field after scoring his second goal. Raghunath (39th 60th minutes) scored from a penalty stroke and then a penalty-corner.
Akashdeep Singh (33rd) Ramandeep Singh (54th) and Danish Mujtaba (60th) were the other scorers. After a barren first quarter India opened its account in the 18th minute when Rupinder's drag-flick hit the top of the right side. A minute later he was again on target but was seen in considerable pain just after the strike.
He limped off the field and didn't come back for the rest of the 41 minutes. There was a spell of five minutes from the 21st and 25th minutes when India successfully earned five penaltycorners - but Raghunath missed all five of them. In the third quarter Akashdeep deflected home a misdirected penalty-corner from Raghunath to make it 3-0 in the 33rd minute. Finally in the 39th minute Raghunath found his name on the scorers' list as he converted a penalty stroke to make it 4-0.
The final quarter saw India slam three more goals with two of them coming in the closing minute of the match. Raghunath found the target with his tenth drag-flick. In shooting Oman's Said al Hashmi finished third in the stage one qualification of 25m rapid fire pistol with a total score of 291 (97 97 97). China's Li Yuehong emerged winner with a score of 295.
Hashmi will now compete with 23 participants on Wednesday for a place in the final. South Korea's Jang Daekyu was second with 293. In beach volleyball both of Oman's teams lost. In a Pool A match Malaysia's Rafi Nordin and Mohammed Mahadi beat Oman's Mazin al Hashmi and Faisal al Subhi 21-13 21-19 while in Pool F the Japanese duo of Yuya Ageba and Yoshiumi Hasegawa beat the Omani combination of Haitham al Shereiqi and Ahmed al Hosni 21-9 21-18.
Oman's teenaged swimmer Issa al Adawi finished fourth out of seven participants in his 400m freestyle heats with a time of 4m26.11s and bowed out.
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