Though the Indian hockey players have registered their splendid victory over South Africa, there are still some challenging tasks ahead without a doubt. The start has indeed revived enough confidence among the Indian players, but they were at the same time aware of the tougher fights on the ground in this edition of Hockey World Cup at Kalinga Stadium in Bhuvneshwar.
They blanked the South African team with a significant margin. This is their third consecutive win since 2013 and second triumph in the World Cup with a score of three fine field goals in just four minutes. This made the Indian players confident that the match was now out of South Africa’s reach.
India scored its first goal in the first quarter’s ninth minute. Just after two minutes of the play another goal by Akashdeep Singh banged into the opponent’s goalpost.
The South African hockey team was way off their game and disappointed the audience with their field performance. It was evident in their failure to score a point during the second penalty corner in the nineteenth minute of the second quarter of the game.
There was sufficient chance for the South African team to make a comeback. They even came close to scoring in the 40th minute – but our cautious captain PR Sreejesh went out of his limit line to stop Richard Pautz.
The opponent team continued with some fine counter attacks in the third quarter and earned a precious penalty corner but to no avail. However, two more goals were added to the Indian side tally that dwindled the South Africans’ players spirits. The Indian team won with Simranjeet Singh scoring the fifth goal through the fourth penalty corner in the last quarter of the match.