CHENNAI: When the women’s hockey team wakes up on Thursday morning, they will do so with a kind of regret that will be hard to explain.
What will hurt them is the fact that they came within the slightest of deviations to possibly take their semifinal against Argentina into a shootout.
On top of the D, stood Gurjit Kaur with nine minutes remaining.
The injection was perfect, the stopper was good and Gurjit’s drive was low, fierce and goal-bound — everything you need in a good penalty corner. But keeper, Maria Succi, was equal to the task and batted the strike away to safety. It was one of the few times India looked like scoring after the first quarter.
For the vast majority of the last 45 minutes, they were trying to stop Las Leonas from finding a way.
They retreated too soon rather than try to release pressure. Against Australia, they had pressure-releasing outballs and players made themselves available for short passes. That option was seldom available to them on Wednesday.
That meant Argentina, who will face the Netherlands in the final, took control of the midfield battle very early on.
The only time they relinquished it was during the fourth quarter when India was desperately seeking an equaliser.
That could have come with 17 seconds to go when India appealed for a penalty corner but the video umpire rejected that request. By then, though, the fire was doused.
The fire was burning bright within two minutes.
After receiving a pass inside the D from Vandana Katariya, Neha Goyal moved one way before swivelling her hips to move the ball the other way.
Moccia Sanchez was caught unawares with the sudden turn in direction and conceded a penalty corner. Just like she did against Australia, Gurjit did the rest. 1-0.
The celebrations told its story. Given minimal chance to even get out of the group stages, the improbable was still on.
The World No 2 could have responded immediately as they had a penalty corner of their own six minutes later but first rusher Salima Tete got a stick to deflect it behind.
By the beginning of the second quarter itself, the game was beginning to set into an identifiable pattern. Even if the possession stats were more or less equal, Argentina had the ball in more dangerous areas of the pitch, especially down their left flank where No 7 Agustino Albertarrio was out-running India’s defenders. Her 4d skills — picking the ball and dribbling — was causing all sorts of problems. India did try and contain her by asking two women to shadow her but it frequently didn’t yield the right result. It was no surprise when Argentina, who have won four medals at the Olympics since 2000, earned a penalty corner via Albertarrio. Skipper Noel Barrionuevo, who has more than 160 goals international goals, stepped up to convert.
At half-time, it was evident what needed to be done for India to claw their way back into the contest. Even though it was still 1-1, Argentina was controlling the tempo and had more than the twice the number of circle penetrations. India needed to change their tactics to lessen the gap between their middle third and final third. Katariya and Lalremsiami were hardly in the game and the midfield was being overrun because of the physical nature of the contest. Surely trying to hold out for 30 minutes was going to be too much of an ask.
They didn’t heed that warning and let Argentina in again, this time through the right. Deep Grace Ekka allowed the ball to hit her feet inside the D and Barrionuevo put her side in front.