Pakistan volleyball win medal at Asian Games after 64 years

OKAZAKI CITY (Agencies): Pakistan’s volleyball team capped their impressive Asian Games run with a bronze medal at the Okazaki Chuo Sogo Park Gymnasium, beating China 3-0 to end a 64-year wait for a medal in the sport — their first since claiming bronze at the 1962 Jakarta Games, behind Japan and India. The medal came a day after Pakistan’s hopes of reaching the gold-medal match were ended by Iran, the three-time defending champions, who beat them 3-0 in the semi-final. Iran will face host nation Japan in the gold-medal match. Pakistan, needing to beat China to secure the bronze, did so in straight sets: 25-18, 25-16, 25-18. Opposite hitter Murad Khan led the way with 18 points. Outside hitters Afaq Khan and Ali Usman Faryad added 14 apiece, with Musawer Khan contributing eight; Mohammad Hamad and Hamid Yazman also added three. China opened the first set with a block at the net and the sides traded evenly until 4-4, before China pulled ahead 7-4. Pakistan’s defence steadied the ship, levelling at 9-9, and the set stayed tight as the lead changed hands more than once; Pakistan briefly went ahead 11-10 before China hit back with two straight points to lead 12-11. From there, though, Pakistan took over.

They built a two-point cushion at 16-14, stretched it to 19-15 as their spiking began to click, and kept improving their serve-receive as the set slipped away from China. Pakistan closed it out 25-18 in 21 minutes. The 26-year-old Murad top-scored in the set with six points, Ali Usman added four, and Afaq and Musawer chipped in three apiece. The second set followed a similar script early on — level at 4-4 before China again moved ahead 7-4 — but a timeout appeared to settle Pakistan’s nerves. They came back to level at 8-8, then took the lead for good at 10-9. From there the gap only grew: 16-11, then 19-13, then 23-15, with Pakistan’s attacking numbers doing the talking — their spikes were landing successfully 75 per cent of the time (33 of 44 attempts) compared to just 45 per cent for China (17 of 38), and Pakistan out-blocked China five to three at the net.

Pakistan wrapped up the set 25-16 in 20 minutes. Murad and Afaq both scored six points in the set, while Musawer, Mohammad Hamad and Ali Usman added two each. Pakistan carried that momentum straight into the third, racing to a 6-1 lead before China briefly responded to close to 7-6. Pakistan pushed on regardless, building leads of 10-6, then holding off a China fightback that twice closed the gap to within a point or two, before pulling clear again at 15-12 and 18-14. The lead stretched to 22-17, and after that China could only manage a single further point as Pakistan closed out the set — and the match — 25-18 to confirm the bronze medal. The statistics told the same story as the previous two sets: Pakistan’s spike success rate was 69 per cent (15 of 22) to China’s 39 per cent (10 of 26), and Pakistan recorded six blocks in the set to China’s none. Ali Usman and Murad led the scoring in the decisive set with six points each; Afaq and Hamid Yazman scored four each, while Musawer and Hamad added two apiece. The result marks the finest Asian Games showing in Pakistani men’s volleyball history outside of that 1962 bronze, and comes on the back of a strong campaign that also included wins over Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and India before the semi-final defeat to Iran.