Impressive India relish a Dutch feast on Pro League debut
BHUBANESWAR: On the eve of the match, from India chief coach Graham Reid to Dutch midfielder Seve van Ass, the talk was about the unpredictability of the Indian hockey team. “You never know which Indian team will turn up,” van Ass had said.
It turned out that India’s perhaps best avatar in a long time showed up as a complete team performance helped the hosts hammer world No 3 Netherlands 5-2 on their Pro League debut. Reid passed his first real test against a top team with flying colours as Manpreet Singh’s men bagged a full three points in the 2020 edition opener.
It was a high intensity game with relentless attacks from an impressive India, putting the 2018 World Cup finalists under pressure from the start.
“We had got the nod from our coach to go on the attack from the start,” said drag-flicker Rupinder Pal Singh, who scored a brace (12th and 46th minutes). Gurjant Singh (first), Mandeep Singh (34th) and Man-of-the-match Lalit Upadhyay (36th) scored one goal each while Jip Janssen (14th) and Jeroen Hertzberger (28th) scored for the visitors at the Kalinga Stadium here.
The Indian forwards were backed by the defence who performed brilliantly, allowing the Netherlands to score only once in as many as nine penalty corner opportunities. First rusher Amit Rohidas was impeccable in thwarting Dutch chances with goalkeeper PR Sreejesh keeping the ball out when Rohidas missed. World No5 India, on the other hand, converted two of their seven PC chances.
Just 13 seconds into the match and India stunned the visitors with the opener. Forward Mandeep poached the ball immediately after pushback by the Netherlands and a one-two with Gurjant resulted in an incredible start for India with the latter firing past Netherlands goalkeeper Pirmin Blaak to finish off a sensational attack. Gurjant’s goal is the fastest in Pro League history and the fastest ever by an Indian, surpassing Ajit Singh’s 1976 record of 15 seconds. However, Hindustan Times could not independently verify the statistic as FIH did not maintain such records earlier.
India rocked the visitors again with Rupinder converting India’s first set piece to take a 2-0 lead.
However, two minutes later, the Dutchmen found a response thanks to Janssen’s drag-flick that rattled the bottom left corner. The Dutch looked more like a top team in the second quarter as they pressed the Indian defence back resulting in Hertzberger’s field goal three minutes from halftime, levelling the contest at 2-2.
The European outfit tried to continue the momentum but India look very much in control in the second half, threatening more goals by playing giveand-go hockey and creating more chances.
Four minutes into the second half, skipper Manpreet Singh created a brilliant ball, pushing it to Mandeep in the striking circle, whose powerful hit was enough to give India the lead again (3-2).
India restored their two goal cushion when an unmarked Upadhyay tapped the ball into an unguarded net after Harmanpreet Singh drew the Dutch defenders and goalkeeper towards him. Rupinder rubbed more salt onto Dutch wounds when he scored his second when his strong flick hit the board to put India 5-2 ahead.