Defending champions take on 2016 bronze medallists in semifinal
After a valiant display against the Belgians, the Indian junior team has a bigger task at hand as they take on Germany in the semifinals of the junior hockey World Cup at Kalinga Stadium in Bhubaneswar on Friday.
When they lost to France in their opener, most had expected that India wouldn't be able to go too far in the tournament. But the players as well as men's chief coach Graham Reid remained confident that they would beat Belgium in the quarterfinals.
And that was exactly the case as they put on a resilient show against a team that didn't give up on trying to score throughout the match. The Belgium players kept coming down the left, right and centre but the Indian defence were up to it.
India had failed to register a clean sheet in their group games but they did earn one on the day it mattered. Belgium had as many 11 shots on goal, 24 circle entries and three penalty corners. Despite all the domination, India held on.
Not for once did they lose their cool and they would have to do it all over again against the Germans, who have won the tournament for a record six times and won the bronze in the 2016 edition of the tournament in Lucknow.
Germany have so far won all their matches in the tournament. In their group matches, they beat Argentina, Pakistan and Egypt and earned a hard-fought win against Spain in the quarterfinals. Although they conceded a late goal, they equalized with less than a minute on the clock and won the game via shootouts following some great goalkeeping by Jean Danneberg.
Unlike many teams, they haven't scored too many goals but they have won against strong opponents and that will give them a lot of confidence going into the semifinals. However, they will be without injured their top scorer and penalty corner specialist Benedikt Schwarzhaupt, who had so far scored four goals in the tournament.
Despite that it will be quite a challenge for the Indian team and Reid is well aware of that. "You should never ever write Germany off even till the last seconds. They have proven over time that they are a top-class side especially at this level," said Reid during a virtual press conference after the Belgium match on Wednesday.
But while the Indians were brilliant defensively, a lot of praise should be given to their drag-flickers who were on the money. They got one shot and they made full use of it. Sanjay, who had scored eight goals so far, could have taken the shot but with that one turn he took both the runners out of the equation and it was up to Shradhanand Tiwari to hit the target and what a shot it was.
But the drag flickers would surely love to have more chances and that is one area where India would like to improve upon against Germany - to have more circle penetrations and create more chances once inside the D.
Also, as Reid said on Wednesday, India seemed to be sleeping in the first seven minutes and it was lucky that the Belgians did not take advantage of it. India would also look to work on that and start the game on a positive note.
However, one thing for certain is that the Indians aren't going anywhere without a fight. They showed their mettle on Wednesday and one can expect to see similar fighting spirit on Friday.
