Ipoh (Malaysia): Two late goals by debutant Bharat Chikkara and Tushar Khandekar powered India to a 2-0 win against Argentina and into the semifinals of the 16th Sultan Azlan Shah Cup eight-nation hockey tournament here today.
In the semi-finals to be played on Friday, India will meet Malaysia while Australia take on Korea.
The Indian victory resulted in a three-way tie with Australia, India and Argentina all with six points apiece.
However, Argentina were eliminated on inferior goal-difference with Australia taking the top spot and India coming second.
The Indians, needing a win to qualify, left it almost too late as they found the Argentine defence a tough nut to crack. Try as they did, a goal eluded them until the last five minutes when they scored twice.
Given the domination they enjoyed, the Indians should have run up a bigger win, but the Argentine defence too deserved credit for their solid performance before the ceaseless pressure told on their players.
In the first-half, the Indians did all the running, wove all the pretty patterns and had more of scoring opportunities, but the Argentine defenders did not put a foot wrong, literally.
There was fluency and rhythm in the Indian moves that purred like a well-oiled machine. However, the final passing bouts and positional play of the forwards left a lot to be desired.
Argentina, requiring just a draw, preferred to fall back on the ropes, as it were, and absorb the punches like a heavyweight boxer. They did it with aplomb and a measure of confidence that ironically, the Indian defenders did not show on the rare occasions they were under pressure.
Consequentially, it was Argentina who forced two penalty corners, both against run of play, while the Indians drew blank themselves despite repeatedly penetrating into the striking circle.
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It was to India's good fortune that Pedro's drag-flick from the second penalty corner struck the upright and rebounded into play and off the counter-attack that flowed from there, Sardara Singh put Roshan Minz in possession. But Minz drove wide to second angle to waste India's best scoring chance.
Coach Joaquim Carvalho switched players in an attempt to sustain the tempo. To an extent, the substitutions ensured that there were always fresh legs up front, but then, with Argentina defending in numbers, the Indian forwards found themselves in a maze that took them around in circles and nowhere near the target.
The early minutes of the second-half saw Argentina showing rare urgency, but soon the game fell into the familiar pattern with the Indians dominating. Twice in the first 10 minutes the Indians nearly scored. Chikkara failed to deflect a Saradara free-hit and then Minz, after dodging past the goalkeeper, saw his hit looping over the net off a defenders stick.
Almost immediately, the Indians received their first penalty corner, but their specialist drag-flicker Ramachandra Raghunath was on the bench and Harpal Singh's tentative direct hit was ineffective.
Raghunath was soon brought on, but he left within minutes with a yellow card suspension, his second in as many matches, for bringing down an Argentine player.
As the clock ticked to full time, India grew in desperation as the well-organised Argentine defence that had read the Indian game rather too well, gave nothing away.
To India's credit, they kept chipping away the Argentine wall and finally blew a hole in the 67th minute when Minz broke through from the right, passed to Tushar Khandekar whose square pass was neatly swept in by Chikkara.
The Indians then stepped on the throttle and about a minute left, scored their second goal as Khandekar found the boards from a Minz pass to deliver the knockout punch.
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