Indian women’s hockey team
“I told the girls, ‘If I had told you six months ago that we would play a quarterfinal against Australia at the World Cup and draw 0-0, would you have believed it? They did, however, win three matches across the two rounds, while scoring 13 goals in the process. England had 20 shots on goal and 12 penalty corners in their 0-0 draw with India, while Australia managed 13 shots and five penalty corners in India’s last game.
I don’t think, considering the position they were in six months ago, they would have believed it,” said Marijne in a video released by Hockey India.
The basis of our game is our defence, and we do that really well,” Marijne said. Speaking about the Australia match, Marijne said, “We evaluated the game with the team, and sometimes these things happen in a process. Indeed, India have produced a fascinating campaign, with almost everyone contributing at different stages. The only glaring gap has been their inability to convert chances into goals consistently — something that eventually ended their hopes of reaching the semifinals. “We have really made good progress, and it’s not easy to score goals against these teams. Germany, too, have been through a transition since the Paris Olympics and could not make the semifinals after losing their two crucial matches against Argentina and Belgium. Neither could find a way past the Indian defence. Sometimes you take a step back to make two steps forward. But again, we didn’t lose; we just didn’t win.”
The Indian women’s hockey team will look to end their World Cup campaign on a high when they face Germany in the fifth-sixth place classification match at Wagener Hockey Stadium in Amstelveen on Thursday.