Hockey World Cup Part 2

So the group stages of hockey world cup is finally over. None of the 3 Asian teams in the tournament made it to the semi-finals. The Indians and the Pakistanis were a huge let down, even the energetic and enthusiastic Koreans didn't make this time around... A disappointing end to a tournament that started of so brightly for the Indians and Koreans, and a further disappointment for hockey in Asia. The Koreans are generally a very consistent team but this time around they lost to a lower ranking team in New Zealand, I'm not in anyway saying that the Black Sticks are bad, no they are not, but the Koreans are so much more better in every single aspect of the game.

This inconsistency is a huge burden for all 3 teams, Pakistanis won against the Spaniards and lost all its other matches, India won against the Pakistanis and lost its following 3 matches, the Koreans beat the dutch and a stupid lost to NZ cost them a place in the semi-finals.

Nevertheless though, there were some brilliant performance in some matches, the Pakistanis played really well against their more fancied opponents, the Australians. They were actually leading the match 1-0 but eventually lost 2-1. The Pakistanis abandon their usual Asian style of play and adopted a more cautious counter attacking game which was really good. This actually shows that some Asian teams have the capability to adopt the European playing style and the same time they can be successful in it.

The Indians on the other hand scored some fantastic goals in their match against the South Africans, and if it wasn't for the stupid video referral thingy, they could have actually won the match. The 2ND and 3rd goal that the Indians scored were a brilliant master-piece of quick interchange of passes and mesmerising stick work from the forwards. Even the disallowed goal was equally brilliant and i would have placed my bet on it to be included as one of the best goals of the tournaments.

The semi finals is going to be a really interesting affair, with England make it thru for the first time in 24 years. The Germans, Dutch and Australians are the usual candidates, but the english have played so well so far that I'm actually falling in love with the style of hockey that they play. So although im not going to place my money on them, i certainly think that the have the capability to lift the trophy for the first time.