Mandeep Singh scored a hat-trick as India crushed Canada 7-3 to enter the final of the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup hockey tournament.
After a rest day, the round-robin league will finish on Friday when all six teams will play their respective last match.
In India’s dominating show, the 24-year-old Mandeep fired in three quick goals (20th, 27th and 29th minutes), all of them coming in the second quarter, after Varun Kumar had given India the lead in the 12th minute of the high-scoring match.
At half time, India were 4-0 up in the match before Canada reduced the margin through a strike from Mark Pearson in the 35th minute.
Amit Rohidas (39th), Vivek Prasad (55th) and Nilakanta Sharma (58th) struck later to take the game beyond the reach of the Canadians who scored two late goals through Fin Boothroyd (50th) and James Wallace (57th).
With the victory, India continued their unbeaten show in the tournament with three wins and a draw. South Korea have had a similar run in their four matches.
India play their final league match against Poland on Friday.