ISLAMABAD: The Men’s Junior Asia Cup 2023, commencing in Salalah, Oman, on Tuesday, will feature the best young Asian men’s hockey teams.
The event is important as three positions are up to achieve in the upcoming FIH Junior Hockey Men’s World Cup 2023, to be played in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
All ten participating teams have been divided into two pools, with Pool A comprising Chinese Taipei, Pakistan, India, Thailand, and Japan. In Pool B, hosts Oman will be joined by Korea, Bangladesh, Korea, Uzbekistan, and Malaysia.
In the pool stage, each team will play each of the other four teams in its pool once. While the third and fourth-place teams fight for the 5-8 place classification, and the top two teams in each pool will move to the semifinals. To avoid placing tenth, the teams that finished fifth in both pools will go head-to-head.
The losing semi-finalists will qualify for the bronze medal match with the two finalists. The bronze medalists will qualify for the FIH Junior Hockey World Cup 2023.
As a host, Malaysia has already qualified for the World Cup; therefore, if Malaysia qualifies for the semifinals of the Junior Asia Cup, the other three teams reaching the semifinals will secure their entry into the World Cup as well.
Malaysia has already qualified for the FIH Junior Hockey Men’s World Cup 2023 as the host of the competition, which will be held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, from 5-16 December 2023.
Spain, Belgium, France, Germany, and the Netherlands are the European qualifiers as the teams classified at the EuroHockey Junior Championship 2022 in the top-5 list.
New Zealand and Australia are qualified through the Oceania Junior World Cup Qualifiers 2022.
Egypt and South Africa have qualified from Africa, finishing as the two top teams at the Junior Africa Cup 2023.
Chile, Argentina, and Canada have qualified from Pan America. The top three teams from Asia will complete the full set of sixteen teams that will fight for the title at the FIH Junior Hockey Men’s World Cup 2023.
— APP
