Winning, they say, is a habit in sport. And so can be losing. At the moment, the Indian men’s hockey team simply can’t find a way to get past the finish line in the FIH Pro League. On Thursday in Amstelveen, they found the most bizarre way yet to lose a match, going down 1-2 against Argentina after a barely believable sequence of events in the closing minutes. With this, they have lost all their four games in the European leg of the tournament so far.
Let’s start at the end. With less than a couple of minutes left, India were chasing the game, trailing 1-2. Jarmanpreet Singh’s superb pass into the circle, drilled from a distance down by the right flank, was controlled beautifully by Abhishek, who then drove down the byline into the danger area. The Argentine defence, rattled, rushed into tackle him and a penalty stroke was awarded for the denial of a goalscoring opportunity. The umpire wanted to review it though, as he is well within his rights, and the decision was upheld. Jugraj Singh, in the absence of injured captain Harmanpreet Singh, stepped up and scored but now Argentina wanted to use their review to check for validity. They had a case, as it turned out, because Jugraj’s front foot was ahead of the ball.
But now India weren’t happy with the review, and somehow convinced the official at the other end to have another look at the whole phase of play, where it emerged that the goalkeeper Tomas Santiago, who was having a stormer of a match, was off the line before Jugraj’s offence happened. A retake was awarded, but Jugraj ended up missing it anyway as Santiago came up with one last massive save to seal his own player-of-the-match award and three points for Argentina.
Architects of their downfall
You could make a strong case that for the fourth match running, India were the architects of their own downfall, and ended up grabbing defeat from the jaws of at the very least a draw to enforce shootouts.
The evening started with a passionate team speech by stand-in captain Hardik Singh in the huddle, the message roughly demanding his teammates to manage the game with intelligence and create outcomes as much as possible. It certainly led to a brighter start from India. In the fourth minute, a stellar crossfield aerial pass from Hardik led to a Penalty Corner. And for the third time in four matches this week, India converted their first chance. With captain and talisman Harmanpreet Singh watching on from the stands, the onus was on Jugraj and he nailed a low flick. It was a lead that India’s start deserved and an immediate reaction to the performance on Wednesday.
Another problem in the previous match was conceding quickly after restarts, and India did concede a PC right away after taking the lead. This time, though, Krishan Pathak was alert to pad the flick away from Tomas Domene and off the resulting scramble, resorted to a football goalkeeper clearance, booting the ball away aerially. With a couple of minutes, Argentina won another PC and this time Pathak brought out an even better save, putting his foot towards his right to keep out a ripper of a flick from Domene. But with six minutes to go in Q1, Domene did eventually find a way past Pathak from the third PC of the match. The defence was beaten by Domene, this time going high over Pathak’s shoulder.
With a couple of minutes to go in the opening quarter, Abhishek drew a world-class save from Santiago as the Indian forward unleashed a powerful reverse hit on goal from the edge of the circle. It was reminiscent of a save from PR Sreejesh from a penalty stroke almost exactly a year back, as Santiago put the stick out to his right for a stunning reflex block. The second quarter was more cagey and goalless.
It was Argentina who started the second half on the front foot. As the quarter went on, both teams were losing possession in the final third, thanks to some solid deep defending, and the match was start-stop at this point, with plenty of whistles from the referees. The start of the final quarter was fairly even and open, and three minutes into it, Nicolas Keenan produced a brilliant 3D-skill run from the left flank to win a PC and Pathak, who was playing the full match and not rotating with Suraj Karkera, was alert to the danger from the drag-flick. But Domene wouldn’t be denied shortly after as the Delhi SG Pipers player went high once more and Pathak was beaten over his right shoulder for the second time in the match, almost a carbon copy of the first goal India conceded.
And so India were chasing the game once more and nearly got the reward for their final push. It wasn’t to be as they leave Amstelveen without adding to their points tally. “It doesn’t matter whether we play well or badly, we need to win,” was Hardik’s pithy summation of the afternoon. After four close defeats, India are searching for that winning feeling.
Hardik Singh stood in as captain for the injured Harmanpreet Singh. (FIH Photo) 
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