#2 World Cup 1975
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The 1975 World Cup was the third edition of the men’s field hockey world championships. India had come third in the first edition in 1971 while in 1973 they improved slightly as they made the finals before losing out to the Netherlands on penalties.
After beating hosts Malaysia 3-2 in the semi-final, India faced their traditional rivals Pakistan in the final. Surjit had opened the scoring for India and the evenly contested match saw Ashok Kumar score the all-important deciding goal in the 2-1 victory in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
The victory was a special one as the team was prepared under the patronage of a State government – it was due to an internal feud between two factions of the Indian Hockey Federation– a low-key team that lost to a Pan-American team in the pool shrugged off its lethargy in time and went on to win the World Cup.
