Malaysia humiliate India 3-0 in Sepaktakraw event

Doha, Dec 2 (UNI) Ever heard of a half team representing a country in the Asian games and playing a half match while the other half is struggling to get the visas! Well, this was the case with the Indian Sepaktakraw team which made a laughing stock of themselves when they lost to title contenders Malaysia 3-0 in the men's team event in the Asian games here today.

India had withdrawn from this event and had notified the organisers about this. But, suddenly the decision was reversed and the team entered into the competition only to be thoroughly exposed.

India did not have a full team and not enough players to play the full match and had to concede the third Regu for lack of players.

Malaysia did nothing extraordinary because a rag-tag Indian team hardly knew the basics of the game at this level of competition.

Indians most of the time looked bemused at their rivals' display and after making some futile attempts to match their rivals, they gave up and enjoyed the game while conceding the points galore.

After getting thrashed in two Regus (two sets in each Regu), the Indians failed to field the players for the third Regu and conceded it.

Malaysia collected full 42 points in each Regu to total their score to 126. Indians earned seven and 10 points in the first Regu, 12 and seven in the second Regu to lose the match 36-126.

After the match, Indian coach D Srinivas said his team had to forfeit the third Regu ''because unfortunately we could not secure visas for all our players, so we had to forgo the third Regu.'' ''The rest of the team should be arriving this evening,'' he said.

He was hopeful his team will do better in the doubles event.

Captain Biken Singh Chabungbam sounded confident of doing well in the next match.

''We will definitely win our matches once our full set of players arrive,'' he said.

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