FIH Olympic qualifier

[jayakris]

USA beat NZ 1-0. So, we now need only a draw against Italy today. But, we are not going to top the pool . So, likely to be Germany in the SF. But, first have to do the job against Italy to make it happen.

But if we handle Italy and lose the SF, we still have a second chance to qualify in the 3rd place match, right? It looks like we need to hold our nerves and take care if Italy to get two chances, then. If we can't get the job done from this point, we clearly do not deserve to qualify.

[sanjay8886]

India defeated Italy 5-1 and has entered the semis.

[jayakris]

Okay, now two chances to qualify. Go India!!!

[ssp]

Pleased to progress into the semis. Don't have much confidence in beating Germany, but let's hope we win the play off. Won't be easy, but let's hope for the best.

[arjun2761]

Hopefully, India can beat Germany at home in Ranchi! If not, we should definitely be able to beat the loser of the US-Japan tie. If we still can't get in, we definitely didn't deserve to be in.

[jayakris]

India has gone up 1-0 on Germany near the end of Q1. Deepika scored on a PC drag flick. Go go go!

GER equalizes in Q2. 1-1

[sameerph]

Tied 1-1 at half time. We were dominating and Germany scored against the run of play. Now, they can get their confidence back unfortunately.

[sameerph]

Oh, drama in last few minutes. Germany took the lead for 2-1 with 3 mins to go and we eqalised for 2-2 with a minute to go.

And it goes to a Penalty shootout.

[SaniaFan]

Lost, in the end, on sudden death after teams ended with 3-3 after penalty shoot out.

Hopefully they'll win tomorrow against Japan to win bronze and qualify.

[jayakris]

I guess we are playing better than we expected. Everybody expected us to lose to Germany and we took it all the way to the end. Maybe we will do the job against Japan.

[sameerph]

Yes, after the first match against USA, we are playing well. It was better than expected match against Germany for me. Against Japan, we have won 2 last key matches- Asian games bronze medal match and Asian champions trophy final. Hope we do it third time.

If we play as well as we have been in last 2-3 matches, we have a very good chance. Japan has been playing decently too here, drew against Germany like we did and lost by 1 goal against USA like we did. So, it will be a close one.

From the other qualifying tournament, Korea and Malyasia got knocked out before SF. So, only 2 Asian teams will be there in Paris- China and the winner of India/Japan.

[arjun2761]

Hard luck for Team India against Germany. We absolutely need to beat Japan at home to keep our momentum going and qualify in. If we make it in, we have shown that we can play with the top 4-5 teams such as Germany, so we'd have at least some chance of a medal performance if we get the breaks we need....

[sameerph]

We trail 0-1 at half time against Japan. We need to somehow salvage something in the second half, else our Paris qualifying chances are gone. No second chance here.

[jayakris]

Come on India, fight!

[jayakris]

And we couldn't do it with 2 chances to qualify for Olympics. 0-1 loss to Japan. Proved without any doubt that we didn't deserve to be in the field and that we are NOT one of the top- 12 teams in the world. If you can't do it at home with two chances, you just aren't good enough.

Can we get our coach back from the last Olympics and go back to the drawing board? We just wasted all we had gained till the last Olympics' time.