With two goals in the last minute and three in the third quarter compared to a solitary strike in the first 30 minutes of play India put out a 6-0 victory over lowest ranked Thailand in the third and last pool match and with three wins in as many as matches made it to the Thursday Quartefinal of the Hockey World League Round 2 (women) in Delhi.
India, despite total domination, failed to strike as it would have desired in the first half, but three goals in the third quarter, and two in the last minute of the game changed the complexion of the game.
Rani Ramphal and Jaspreet Kaur scored a brace each while Amandeep Kaur and Vandana accounted for the rest.
As an irony of sort the quarterfinal line up is like this: India which did not concede a goal will meet Singapore which could not score single goal in three matches.
Braving bulwark kind of defence that least ranked Thailand put up in the first half, India struck three goals in the third quarter to add a solitary early goal of Amandeep Kaur to provide one-sided looking 4-0 lead at the end of third quarter.
Thailand girls put up a great defence almost 35 minutes, with their goalie excelling in whatever did, and denied dominating host any elbow room in the scoreboard. India in fact had to waste a whopping ten penalty corners, half of them ending empty at the alert goalie.
The deadlock was broken when captain Ritu Rani sent a strong pass from 25-yard line, picked up by Soundarya Yandala, whose parallel pass was tapped in by Amandeep Kaur to the left of otherwise reflexive goalie. The 1-0 lead obtained in the 26th minute gave a big relief to India which was all over the place but could not move the scoreboard.
The third quarter of course was a different two goals coming in a short spell, first by Jaspreet who bounced on to a rebound of her own shot to put the ball above goalie’s head.
A minute later experienced Rani Ramphal, who just missed a sitter, and on whom a penalty stroke was given only to be overruled by another umpire, came up with a stunner in a melee to give India 3-0 lead.
Next goal for India came from ever-green forward Vandana, who knelt low to divert a long shot from the centre of D (4-0).
Hardworking Anupa Barla did all the spade work for the fifth goal, aided by Amandeep who sent a slow parallel bemusing the goalie who was covering the acute angle, all the experienced Rani had to do was to just deflect it into the open goal mouth.
India’s sixth goal, a straight conversion by Jaspreet came after hooter, and it was a consolation since it could at least convert a token penalty corner out of 14.
Wednesday is rest. All the teams will play quarterfinal on Thursday
Quarter Final Match schedule:
13:15 QF1 Malaysia v Ghana
15:30 QF2 Kazakhstan v Thailand
17:45 QF3 Poland v Russia
20:00 QF4 India v Singapore
All timings IST