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Hockey Olympic Qualifiers: Indian women still in the running
The women's team battles it out in Ranchi while the Indian men have left for South Africa to train for the upcoming Olympic Games.
Indian Women's hockey team wins their first game in the qualifiers / @TheHockeyIndia
Olympic Qualifying Tournaments in Ranchi and Valencia continue to witness exciting hockey with some close and unexpected results as India and Canada stormed their way into the reckoning with convincing wins on day two of the tournaments.
The hosts India defeated New Zealand 3-1 for its first win in two matches while Canada fired three past Malaysia to remain in the hunt for a semi-final berth in the Valencia women’s qualifier.
India, after losing the first game to USA 0-1 has now its third and last match against Italy in hand. The other game between USA and New Zealand would be crucial for India as the position in the pool is tight. An outright win with a good margin would be what the home team would look for in its match against bottom placed Italy.
With some sizable upsets and some attention-grabbing wins, the second day of Qualifiers thickened the plot in each of the pools, offering every team that played a growing sense of what they must do to draw closer to Paris.
Starting off the day in Ranchi, Chile came roaring back from their defeat with a huge 6-0 win over Czechia. Five second-half goals gave them their first points of the qualifiers, which left Czechia at the bottom of Pool A. The next game saw Japan survive a barrage of 14 German penalty corners to secure a 1-1 draw and maintain their unbeaten record over the last two days. A draw puts both teams on level points at the top of the pool.
In Pool B, the USA extended their strong start to the qualifiers, doing enough to secure a 2-0 victory against Italy. They doubled their points tally and now sit three points clear at the top of the pool. Lower in the table, India registered their first points of their home tournament, beating New Zealand 3-1. With all goals coming in the first quarter, the scoring settled to put the hosts on level points with the Black sticks after two games.
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