We can’t afford so many cards: Men's Hockey skipper Manpreet Singh

Giselle Ansley (3rd minute), Tess Howard (40th) and Hannah Martin (53rd) scored for England, while Vandana Katariya (60th) scored the lone goal for India

Team India, looking to make amends for not being able to find a place on the podium four years ago, will be uneasy after their 4-4 draw against England which should have been a fairly straightforward win considering they were 4-1 up with 14 minutes to go. But suddenly the Indians started ‘losing’ players. 

India got three cards—Varun Kumar twice (one for five minutes in the first half and then for 10 minutes in the second half) and Gurjan Singh (10-minute suspension in the final quarter for dangerous play). With India down to nine men, the now 11 charged-up Englishmen got the upper hand.

Also Read: CWG 2022 Hockey: England rally late to force 4-4 draw with India

‘Good show overall’

England caught up at 4-4 with seven minutes left. India led for most part of the game, but when the final hooter sounded, they may well have felt lucky to have escaped with a draw and one point. The big lesson for Team India was on-field discipline. “The performance has been good overall so far. Even today, even after those cards, we showed a lot of teamwork and covered each other’s mistakes. But we have to work on that [the suspensions]. We cannot have so many players spending so many minutes outside the field of play. We will have a discussion about this later today,” skipper Manpreet Singh said.

India scored early with Lalit Upadhyay firing in a rebound off a penalty corner. Then Mandeep (13th and 22nd minutes) made it 3-0. Liam Ansell reduced the margin for England (42nd) before Harmanpreet Singh’s penalty corner conversion made it 4-1. Then came the nightmare. Nick Bandurak (47th and 53rd) and Phil Rogers (51st) made it 4-4.

Women lose 1-3

Meanwhile, the Indian women’s hockey team lost 1-3 to England in a Pool ‘A’ match here yesterday.

Giselle Ansley (3rd minute), Tess Howard (40th) and Hannah Martin (53rd) scored for England, while Vandana Katariya (60th) scored the lone goal for India. 

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