THE Malaysian teams rose to the ocasion and delivered yesterday — winning two gold in indoor hockey at the Sea Games.
Malaysia’s men’s and women’s teams both triumphed in their respective finals at the LB Centtro Mall and Convention Centre yesterday.
The women’s final saw Malaysia downing Thailand 2-0 in a penalty shootout after both sides were tied 1-1 at the end of regulation time.
National women’s coach K. Dharmaraj admitted that his charges were made to slog for the win.
“Today’s game wasn’t easy, it was a day where almost everything didn’t work out for us,” he said.
“We had many penalty corners but couldn’t score while Thailand, who didn’t get any penalty corner, scored in one attempt.
“We, however, managed to equalise late in the game and in the penalty shootout our goalkeeper saved the first two penalties while we scored our first two to win the match.”
The women’s squad had won bronze at the 2017 Sea Games.
The men had it slightly easier and successfully defended their gold medal by downing Thailand 3-1 in the final.