Busan (South Korea): Our second consecutive loss has come as a big shock. The 5-0 scoreline has been a further dampner and there has been a pall of gloom in the Indian camp.

South Korea may be a good side, but we had no business losing to them like we did yesterday. In fact, we were thinking in terms of winning before the match.

It was one of our worst matches, so to say. Our attack-line just did not work, the stickwork that we are known for, seemed to desert us.

Having lost to China 0-2 in an earlier match, we’re virtually out of contention for the final in the four-team tournament. Though, if the Koreans beat China and we beat Japan, South Korea would have nine points and the rest three each.

But after our big loss to the Koreans, we can’t even expect to make it on goal average. Actually, that’s somewhere we blundered. We didn’t think about the goal average and went on conceding goals. A loss is a loss, was what went through our minds. So, we tried to create opportunities for ourselves, that too in vain.

I think we have hit a really bad patch. Our forwards, who used to dribble past four or five players at the Commonwealth Games just a couple of months back, seem to run into a wall everytime they have the ball. We have been too slow upfront.

There just doesn’t seem to be a flow. Our bodies don’t seem to be responding at all. Maybe we peaked too early this season. Maybe the camps and the preparation for this tournament had a negative effect on us. The freshness has oozed out of us.

The surprise of the tournament has been Japan beating China yesterday. Though it kept the tournament open, it also scares us because it means Japan is a fine team too. After all, we had lost to China !

But we’ll fight it out in our remaining two matches. We still have a chance to win a bronze and we’ll go all out for it.

We don’t know which team will be playing for bronze. Presuming that we’re playing in it, it can be either China or Japan. Tough it definitely is going to be.

We know what we’re in for now. Like I’d written in my column before, even if we win the bronze, people are going to say that it was just a four-nation tournament and it’s no big deal winning a bronze.

But that’s not how it is. This tournament is really hard and we’re going through it with great difficulty.

Had there been a couple of easy games in the tournament, we could have done some thinking. But here you are, from one loss to another, not knowing what to do. When the team is off-colour, you can’t do much.

Let this not seem like an excuse. I’m not justifying our losses. We’ve played badly and I concede that. But give credit to other teams too. They are all world class.

History has a knack of repeating itself. At 1990 Beijing Asiad too the Koreans defeated us on the same 5-0 scoreline. But in the period I have been with the teams since 1991, Koreans never had it easy against us.

Be it the last Asian Games final or the Asia Cup final, the scored stood a fighting 2-1 in their favour. We even defeated them in the Perth 4-Nation Cup in 1999 before finishing third, a step above the Koreans. But yesterday was another day another match. We will forget this match and focus on bronze. We have two more games to go. We will strive to retrieve some prestige.

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