AHF announces Junior Men's Hockey Asia Cup schedule

The 9th edition of the Men’s Junior Asia Cup is set to take place in Salalah, Oman. The Cup will start on the 23rd of May and conclude on the 1st of June 2023 as announced by the Asian Hockey Federation.

Indian junior hockey team will participate with nine other junior national teams from around Asia in this tournament.

The contestants include Bangladesh, Chinese Taipei, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Oman, Pakistan, Thailand, and Uzbekistan.

For this Junior championship, there is an age appropriation in place that requires all the participating athletes to have been born on or after 1 Jan 2002, making them 21 years old or less.

The top five teams India, Pakistan, Japan, Korea, and Malaysia got an automatic qualification based on their world rankings.

Whereas, Bangladesh, Oman, Thailand, Uzbekistan, and Chinese Taipei won their qualification from the Men’s Junior AHF Cup held in Muscat, Oman in January 2023.

The top three teams from the title tournament, apart from Malaysia which is already qualified as the host, will qualify for FIH Men’s Junior Hockey World Cup 2023.

“The Asian Junior Competitions aim to set a benchmark, creating a significant exposure and developmental opportunity for our young athletes in Asia. We aspire for our youth to experience only the best.” said the President of Asian Hockey Dato Fumio Ogura.

The tournament is making a return after eight years as the last edition in 2021 was canceled due to the pandemic.

India has won the tournament three times including the 2015 edition with current Indian senior captain Harmanpreet Singh being the top goalscorer in the tournament.from