Old foes in final showdown

Guus Vogels walked around with a glittering trophy in his hands, but it wasn’t easy to miss the glisten in his moist eyes every time a camera flash went off. The veteran Dutch goalkeeper, playing probably in his last World Cup, bagged the award for standing like a rock to at least nine Australian shots on target. In the end, though, what left him disconsolate were those two hits he couldn’t block, that shattered his dream of winning a World Cup — the only title he hasn’t won.
In an engrossing second semi-final, Australia and The Netherlands first threw at each other everything that they could. But then Australia threw some more, winning the match 2-1 to set up a final date with champions Germany for the third time in the competition.

In their last two meetings in the final, Australia have lost to the Germans, but if their game on Thursday evening was anything to go by, the Kookaburras could make amends this time.

Consider the statistics: Australia had 28 penetrations in the rival defence against 13 by The Netherlands. They also had 11 shots on target compared to just four from the Dutch, while their ball possession was at an overwhelming 62 per cent.

That doesn’t mean, though, that the Dutch were outplayed. They tried to keep pace with Australia, but aside of the last 15 minutes when they scored one and really pressed for an equaliser, they couldn’t quite flourish.

Australia began like the team they had been in the tournament — hungry for goals. They tested the Dutch defence in the third minute itself, but Grant Schubert’s close-range shot was saved by the ‘keeper. Thereafter, all through the first half, waves and waves of Aussie attacks came and crashed against Vogels. He stood his ground, except in the 27th minute, when drag-flicker Luke Doerner converted the second PC — his seventh in the tournament. That prompted the Dutch to show some urgency, but they had to fall back soon as the Aussies never really took the foot off the pedal.

After the break, Glenn Turner scored in a goalmouth melee to double the Australian lead. With the clock ticking away, Holland upped the ante and got a contentious penalty stroke. Taeke Taekema easily beat the goalkeeper to reduce the deficit in the 58th minute, making Australia see off a nervous 10 minutes.

“It was a very close game, but the better team won. We are looking forward to the final against Germany. We aren’t taking it lightly. We always go into the tournament as favourites, but the Germans seem to win everything. Hopefully the result will be different this time,” Australia’s Jamie Dwyer said.

Earlier, Germany silenced the critics who had doubted their inexperienced team with a clinical 4-1 thrashing of England to move a step closer to an unprecedented fourth World Cup title. While asserting their supremacy, the champions exposed England’s weak defence and avenged their loss to the same opponents in the Euro Cup final.

Germany struck in the sixth minute through Jan-Marco Montag off a penalty corner and within the first 15 minutes, made it 2-0. The second goal, in particular, was an example of using deviations to score off penalty corners. Instead of the normal push-stop-drag-flick routine, Germany opted for a push-stop-drag-drag-flick routine. Specialists Moritz Furste, instead of going for it, dragged to team mate Oliver Korn, who slammed it home.

England tried to fight back and reduced the margin through a stinging penalty corner direct hit by Richard Smith in the 18th minute, but they didn’t quite look like the team who had been troubling every side in the tournament. Germany added another goal to restore a two-goal lead at the breather.

The second half was slightly more balanced, but the English failed to create chances. Linus Butt converted yet another PC in the 60th for Germany to round off the scoreline.