India started with a win in FIH Hockey Pro League, New Zealand gave a tough fight


Bhubaneswar. Two field goals by Mandeep Singh in the last quarter helped India start their campaign with a 4-3 win over New Zealand in the FIH League here on Friday. Mandeep scored in the 51st and 56th minutes. The Indian team was trailing 2-3 at the end of the third quarter. Mandeep Mor scored the 13th and captain Harmanpreet Singh in the 41st minute for the fifth-ranked team in the world rankings.

Sam Lane scored two goals in the 22nd and 35th minutes for New Zealand, the world’s number nine team, while Jake Smith scored another goal in the 34th minute. New Zealand initially adopted a more aggressive approach. Indian goalkeeper PR Sreejesh saved a long range shot early on.

India continues to dominate
Although India got the penalty corner of the match, but Shamsher Singh could not take advantage of it. Neelkant Sharma gave an accurate pass to Mor who scored comfortably and New Zealand goalkeeper Dominic Dixon could do nothing. India were in control and looked to double the lead in the second quarter. But New Zealand had already equalized by scoring a goal on the penalty corner.

The score remained 1-1 in the first half

Surender Kumar stops Sam Lane’s shot. The visiting team took a review, which showed that the ball touched Surender’s leg and then Lane scored from the corner. Soon after, New Zealand got another penalty corner but this time it was blocked by Krishna Bahadur Pathak and Simone Child’s effort failed. After the first half, the score was equal to 1-1.

The match in the third quarter was thrilling in which New Zealand scored two goals in the 34th and 35th minutes. India scored a penalty in the 41st minute with the help of captain Harmanpreet, which made the score 2-3.

Mohammad Raheel made his debut in hockey for India.
The team was down to 10 players at the end of the third quarter as Sumit was shown a yellow card (sent off for 10 minutes). New Zealand earned two penalty corners but did not score. In the last quarter, India played with 10 players for seven minutes, after which Mandeep scored two goals to win the team. Mohammad Raheel made his debut for India. India will now play Spain here on Sunday.

Tags: FIH, FIH Hockey Pro League, Mandeep Singh, sports news

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