India turn up rusty, lose opener to Argentina

Raipur, November 27 

India dished out a lacklustre performance to go down 0-3 to Argentina in the opening match of the Hockey World League (HWL) Final in front of a packed Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Stadium here today.

Argentina converted three penalty corners with Gonzalo Peillat finding the net twice (3rd, 60th minute), while Joaquin Menini scoring once (24th) in the Pool B encounter. India recently jumped two rungs to be placed sixth in the world rankings but that didn't show in their performance against Argentina, who are placed a spot above at the fifth place.

The Argentines dominated the match as the Indians looked disoriented and lacked co-ordination. Argentina's dominance could be gauged from the fact that they earned as many as nine penalty corners in the match to India's one.  The hosts' problems were compounded by the poor display of their forwards, Ramandeep Singh in particular. India looked out of sorts from the word go and the Argentines were quick to pounce on their weakness to earn their first penalty corner as early as in the third minute of the game after Jasjit Singh Kular committed a foul inside the circle.

Argentina's drag-flick exponent Peillat made no mistake in giving his side the lead with a powerful flick to the right of the Indian custodian, PR Sreejesh. Jasjeet, in particular, committed a lot of errors in defence.

Eight minutes into the second quarter, Argentina earned their second penalty corner, courtesy Ignacio Diego Paz's brilliant stick work on the right flank as he dribbled past four Indian players to earn the set piece.

Even though the Indian defence managed to thwart that chance, they conceded two penalty corners in succession, the last of which was utilised by the Argentines when Menini found the back of the net in the 24h minute. 

Germany, Netherlands play out a draw

In the second match of the day, Germany and the Netherlands played out a 0-0 draw. The Netherlands' goalkeeper Jaap Stockmann was declared Man of the Match. The last time the two teams faced each other, the Netherland had routed Germany 6-1 in the Euro Hockey Championship.  —  PTI