From 3 to 7 December the University of
Agriculture in Faisalabad, Pakistan was the venue for the IHF Trophy Tournament
of the South Central Zone for Asia.
6 teams in the men’s competition divided
into two groups and five teams in the women’s competition competed to qualify
for the Continental Phase of the IHF Trophy which will take place in 2015.
The hosts Pakistan and the Yemen were
the strongest teams in the men’s competition. The hosts were convincing from
the very beginning and won their matches in the preliminary round clearly
against Nepal and Bangladesh and thus qualified for the semi-finals. For Yemen
it was a little bit more difficult as they had to overcome a resilient
Afghanistan side narrowly at 31:30. In the semi-finals Pakistan defeated Afghanistan
clearly 43:28, while Yemen had once again an excellent opponent in Bangladesh,
a hurdle they overcame once again narrowly at 33:31.
In the Final the hosts showed their full
power and potential and defeated Yemen clearly at 39:22. In the match for
bronze medal, Afghanistan was better than Bangladesh and won by 38:30.
In the women’s competition that was
played on a round robin base, it was Bangladesh that was the overall winner as
they won all of their matches convincingly. Pakistan was the country that made
the strongest resistance, but even that was not enough as Bangladesh won the
game 34:22. The hosts Pakistan came in second, while Nepal ranked third in the
overall competition.
This results mean that Pakistan is
qualified for the Continental Phase of the men’s competition while Bangladesh
qualified for the women’s.
As usual practice, the International
Handball Federation organized courses for coaches and referees during the
Competition. Mr. Effat Rashad (EGY) was in charge of the coaching course, while
Mr. Radhi Jassim (BRN) headed the course for referees.
The full results summary of the
tournament on the link below: