Press Trust of India
Le Touquet (France), August 4: Talented Chinglensana Singh and seasoned SV Sunil struck a goal apiece Monday evening as the Indian men’s hockey team started their tour of Europe on a bright note with a 2-0 win over hosts France.
The Sardar Singh-led team dominated the proceedings throughout in their opening game. The Indians drew first blood in the 18th minute when the opportunistic Chinglensana capitalised on the defensive lapse to enter the opposition ‘D’ and strike the boards with a powerful hit.
The favourites increased the pressure on the French side with repeated raids in the opposition attacking third, which resulted in the second goal by Sunil.
Sardar, SK Uthappa, Danish Mujtaba and Devinder Walmiki were instrumental in India enjoying the better of exchanges and ball possession. Sunil, Ramandeep Singh and Akashdeep Singh kept French defence on tenterhooks throughout the second quarter.
The highly skillful Sunil scored a brilliant field goal as he did the spadework himself dribbling past a host of French defenders before slotting the ball home in the 26th minute.
Indian team held onto their lead till the end of the game. France upped the ante in the third quarter of the game but the Indian defence foiled their goal-scoring bid.
The best chance was that the hosts had in the third quarter was when they earned two successive penalty corners. However, Indian custodian PR Sreejesh stopped both the hits.
The fourth quarter was a closely-fought battle as both the teams pushed each others to score more goals. French players played with more aggression and they managed to earn back-to-back penalty corners. But both were again brilliantly saved by Sreejesh before Indians went on the counter but could not increase the tally.
Sardar stated after the game that he was satisfied with the overall result, but then there is still scope for improvement. “In any tour, the first win is very important. After getting it, I am sure that the players will learn from their mistakes and perform better,” said Sardar. “We played as per out coach’s gameplan and got the desired results. We are trying some new things and there are areas where we have to perform better in the next match and will again play for victory. France may come out stronger this time with better strategies, but we are ready to face them,” he added.
