Zeenews Bureau
Chandigarh, Feb 04: The Indian hockey team stretched their unbeaten run in the Punjab Gold Cup hockey tournament as they played a 2-2 draw against Holland in the second leg here on Wednesday.
The Indian team had beaten Beijing Olympic champions Germany 2-0 in a game played yesterday.
India, who drew the Dutch 4-4 in the first leg, fell back twice but came back strongly to hold their mighty rivals.
Both India and Holland are on eight points from four
matches and with two more ties remaining, have almost assured
themselves of a title showdown.
Olympic champions Germany and New Zealand are on two
points each after four matches.
The Dutch today earned four penalty corners and managed
to convert one while India could not come up with any.
The visitors took the lead three minutes before the
breather. Jeroen Hertzberger caught the Indian defence napping
and his reverse flick found the back of the net.
However, they could not hold on to the lead for long as
India equalised within two minutes of resumption.
Shivender Singh collected a long ball from Dilip Tirkey
and went past rival goalkeeper Stockmamm before sending the
ball into the net.
Holland earned their first penalty corner in the 16th
minute of the second half but failed to convert it.
However, they earned another one in the very next minute
and Geert Jan Derikx sent the rebound past goalkeeper Baljit
Singh to give Holland a 2-1 lead.
Playing before home crowd, the Indians regrouped and
levelled the score in the 20th minute of the second half.
Prabhjot Singh sounded the post after receiving a long
pass from skipper Sandeep Singh.
Goalkeeper Baljit, who put up an impressive performance
against Germany yesterday, was in the thick of action today as
well as he effected crucial blocks including warding off four
penalty corners.
The Dutch earned their third and fourth penalty corners
towards the end of the match but an alert Baljit thwarted
them.
Holland dominated the first 15 minutes of the first half
and had most of the ball possession. Thereafter, India relied
on counter attacks that put the opposition under pressure.
Indian forwards Prabhjot, Rajpal, Gurbaj and Shivender
led the attacks, but failed to achieve much success.
Shivender missed a golden opportunity in the 30th minute
when he failed to trap a pass from Tushar Khandekar near the
striking area.
Bureau Report
First Published: Wednesday, February 04, 2009, 00:00