India’s men’s hockey team missed out on making history against Belgium

India’s men’s hockey team missed out on creating history in the Tokyo Olympics. This team, captained by Manpreet Singh, had a chance to create history in the Olympics after 41 years. Team India had a chance to stay in the gold medal race, but the 2-5 defeat against Belgium in the semi-final broke this dream.

This defeat will sting Team India for many years. She was giving tough competition to the world champion Belgium till the 49th minute of the match, but in the last 11 minutes it was overwhelming on Team India and from here the dream ended.

The score was level after the third quarter.

By the third quarter of the game, both the teams were tied 2-2. Which of the two teams would reach the final, it was to be decided in the fourth quarter. The Belgian team played aggressive hockey from the beginning of this quarter, as it had played in the remaining three quarters.

He got three penalty corners back-to-back during the 48-49th minute. After failing in two penalty corners, he scored in the third penalty corner to give Belgium the lead. Since then, Team India has been lagging behind in the match.

Then in the 53rd minute, Hendrix converted a penalty stroke to put India behind by two goals. Now India had to score two goals within seven minutes to level the match, but the Indian players could not penetrate Belgium’s defense. On the contrary, John Dohmann scored in the last minute of the game to give Belgium a decisive 5-2 lead.

‘Should have taken advantage of the opportunity’

After this defeat, Team India’s coach, Graham Reid said, ‘We created chances to win the match. Belgium is the best team in the world along with Australia and against these teams you have to take advantage of the opportunity. Unfortunately we didn’t.’

Let us tell you that in this Olympics, Team India has lost only two matches. They had lost 1-7 to world No. 1 Australia in the group stage and now lost 2-5 to world champions Belgium in the semi-finals.