The junior Indian men and women’s hockey teams started their campaign at the Youth Olympic Qualifiers with emphatic wins in Bangkok on Wednesday. The women’s team blanked Singapore 14-0 while the men’s side beat home team Thailand 25-0. The five-day tournament follows the Hockey 5s format.
This explosive short format for field hockey played on a half-regulation size hockey pitch which has three periods of 15 minutes of play. Nine players comprise of a team of which five are allowed on the field duirng a match. Plus there is one-on-one challenge instead of penalty corners.
In their first Pool B match, the women’s team opened their account in the second minute with Sangita Kumari smashing a goal. Three minutes later, Mumtaz doubled the lead with vice-captain Lalremsiami adding to the tally in the seventh minute. Ishika Chaudhary and Sangita made it 5-0 at the end of the first period.
Singapore had no answers to the pace and skills showed by the Indian team in the second period. Deepika scored the sixth and seventh goal in space of two minutes. Sangita, Lalremsiami and Mumtaz came to the party scoring four more goals between them as at the end of second period India were leading 11-0.
There was no respite for Singapore in the final period as Lalremsiami and Sangita added three goals in the final period with the match ending at 14-0. Sangita ended with six goals name while Lalremisiami scored a hat-trick.
Meanwhile, the junior men’s team gave no home ground advantage to Thailand. Seven goals in first period and 10 in the second and eight in third left the Thailand team gasping for breath.
Mohammad Alishan with six goals and Rahul Kumar Rajbhar with five did the bulk of scoring across three periods. Rabichandra Moirangthem and skipper Vivek Sagar Prasad hit the back of the net four times each. Except for the goalkeeper every member of the squad was on scoring sheet at the end of the regulation time.
The junior men’s team will take on Japan in their second pool game on Thursday while the women’s team will take on Korea. The five-day tournament is a qualifying event for Youth Olympic 2018 to be held at Buenos Aires, Argentina which will follow the futuristic Hockey 5s format.
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