Netherland beats India to lift Punjab Gold Cup Hockey

Safin

Netherland beats India to life Punjab Gold Cup Hockey

I was watching the final with high hopes as after the debacle of the Olympics, i was expecting a good run by the Indians against Holland. The form leading up to the Final was good.

Anyway turned out that India managed to get themselves beaten by 1-2. I say managed to cos they played a lot worse then that. The sole goal was due to a penalty stroke which was god sent. While the teams were 0-0 in first half, the second half was more entertaining with more aggressive hockey. India took the lead with the stroke only to squander it away in 2 minutes. Then started a rather noobish display of Hockey. 3 penalty corners missed with the last one being a disgrace. Our ace(Sandeep or Prabhjot i think) didn't even manage to hold the flick for the penalty corner. Or long passes were just flying all over the places. We weren't even able to tap any balls clearly.

Overall we are lucky to have made a 1-2 goal line. It could have been much worse.

Anyway considering how bad we were 1 year back, finishing 2nd in a tourney where all top teams took part is still an improvement. I hope we improve our penalty stroke takers though

Its been an age old problem with India. We have the "specialists" that don't show any of their speciality when it matters

The stadium for a change was packed to capacity at Chandigarh(reminiscent of the the good old days of Indian Hockey). Chandigarh Rox