Jakarta: It was a harsh day for the hosts Indonesia as they were undone by the masters from India, who inflicted them with a 17-0 defeat at the GBK Hockey Stadium in Jakarta.
It was the biggest margin of win in the competition so far, eclipsing Malaysia’s 16-2 victory over Kazakhstan in an earlier match.
Despite the scoreline, the Indonesians could walk with their heads held high as they gave it their best but obviously it was never going to be good enough to match the fifth world ranked team.
“We gave all players a chance to play and get a feel of the conditions and pitch ahead of the tough matches,” said Indian coach Harendra Singh. “We made use of the chances and the performance today is not reflective of our ability.”
India only needed 46 seconds to get on the score sheet with Rupinderpal Singh converting a penalty corner. Two minutes later he doubled India’s advantage and the goal avalanche started. Dilpreet Singh made it 3-0 in the 7th minute before Akashdeep Singh scored the fourth in the 10th minute. Goal number five was contributed by Simranjeet Singh in the 13th minute. Indonesia regrouped after the two-minute break and played much better to give India a tough time to increase the margin. But the Indians managed to prise open the defensive shell to add goals through the efforts of SV Sunil in the 25th minute, Vivek Prasad in the 26th minute, Mandeep Singh in the 29th minute and Dilpreet in the 30th minute for a 9-0 lead at halftime. Harmanpreet Singh was not to left behind as he got into the scoring act, driving home a penalty corner in the 31st minute.
And next, it was the turn of Dilpreet to complete his hat trick with a goal in the 33rd minute to make it 11-0 for India. A goal from Simranjeet in the 38th minute gave India their 12th goal. Lalit Kumar made it 13-0 in the 44th minute and it was only a question of just how many India would add to their tally in the final quarter. And Mandeep ( 46th 49th and 53rd minutes), as well as Amit Rohidass in the 54th minute, completed a goal feast for India
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