India and Belgium join Australia, Germany in hockey semis

TOKYO: India reached the semi-finals of the men’s hockey tournament at the Olympics for the first time since 1980 thanks to a 3-1 win over Britain on Sunday to set up a showdown with Belgium at the Tokyo Games.

Australia and Germany will contest the other semi-final.

India, who had won the last of their eight Olympic hockey gold medals at the 1980 Moscow Games, led 2-0 at halftime thanks to goals by Dilpreet Singh and Gurjant Singh. After conceding a goal in the 45th minute, India sealed the win when Hardik Singh made it 3-1 with just minutes left to play.

Belgium ended Spain’s run with a 3-1 victory, including two goals from top-scorer Alexander Hendrickx.

Earlier on Sunday, Australia reached the semi-finals by beating the Netherlands in a penalty shootout in sizzling Tokyo heat, while Germany overcame Argentina.

A powerful performance by goalkeeper Andrew Charter, who kept a clean sheet in the shootouts — won 3-0 by Australia after the score was 2-2 at the end of regular playing time — helped the Kookaburras win the match.

The Australians had pulled ahead twice in the game, thanks to two goals by Tom Wickham, only to see the hard-fighting Dutch side equalise through goals by Mink van der Weerden and Jeroen Hertzberger.

The result meant the Dutch men’s squad will not feature in the semi-finals of the Olympic hockey tournament for the first time since 1984.

Australia will face Germany on Tuesday after the Germans secured an easy victory over Olympic champions Argentina.

Germany opened the score in the 19th minute when defender Lukas Windfeder shot a penalty corner low and hard at the left side of the goal, leaving Argentina goalkeeper Juan Vivaldi no chance to stop the ball.

Ten minutes into the second half, the German side added to their advantage after scoring through another penalty corner, which gave them little left to fear from the Argentineans.

The fourth quarter saw one goal from each side, including Windfeder’s second, leaving the final score at 3-1.

Published in Dawn, August 2nd , 2021