Breaking Update: Here’s a clear explanation of the latest developments related to Breaking News:India go down 8-0 to Argentina in embarrassing Pro League outing– What Just Happened and why it matters right now.
The Indian men’s hockey team suffered one of their worst defeats in recent times as they were beaten by Argentina 8-0 in their FIH Pro League match at Rourkela’s Birsa Munda Stadium on Thursday.
Harmanpreet Singh and co. were looking to put out a better performance after the loss against Belgium but ended up conceding more goals while scoring none.
Tomas Domene netted four times in the match, becoming the highest scorer this season with 10 goals to his name. Tomas Ruiz, Ignacio Ibarra, Nicolas Della Torre and Lucio Mendez added a goal each.
The match began on a scrappy note, but it was India who started asserting more in the first quarter. They won a penalty stroke after lovely stick work by Aditya Lalage which forced a blatant foul on him. Captain Harmanpreet’s first stroke was saved by Tomas Santiago but he got another after the TV review showed he had moved early. Santiago saved Harmanpreet’s second chance as well to deny India from taking the lead.
A few seconds later, Argentina took the lead thanks to an outstanding finish from Ruiz as he beat the goalkeeper and hit the roof of the net. A minute later, Domene made it 2-0 before the end of the first quarter.
In the second quarter, Argentina ran riot. They scored five goals in a span of 15 minutes. Domene completed his hat trick while Mendez, Delle Torre and Ibarra also got on the scoresheet.
The Indians were guilty of playing poorly, making a mess of simple passes. There was a clear lack of understanding between defenders at the back — Sanjeep Nilan Xess, Harmanpreet, Amit Rohidas and Jarmanpreet Singh and the allowed plenty of space in the midfield for Argentina to exploit. Credit should go to the visiting team who took their chances and made it count.
There were no goals in the third quarter and right at the end of the match, Domene came up with a powerful reverse hit to score his fourth goal of the night.
India head coach Craig Fulton will have a lot of talking to do. He will hope his players will quickly forget this performance and respond positively in the match against Belgium on Saturday.
Relive the match on our blog below: