India and Japan dominate

The Indian women’s hockey team was expected to win its first match of the Hockey World League Round 2 against Kazakhstan easily, but even it would not have expected such domination — an 8-0 verdict against the World No. 33, with almost the entire match being played in the Kazakh half.

India opened the goal-spree in the eighth minute through a penalty corner conversion by Jaspreet Kaur.

By the end of the first half, the home team had taken a 4-0 lead.

The first time the ball entered the Indian half was in the 28th minute, when Vera Domashneva ran a solo all the way from the Kazakh 25-yard line, only to see Symbat Sabazova fail to connect in front of the post.

That was Kazakhstan’s only chance in the first half.

The second half was no different, with India scoring at will and experimenting with its penalty corner executions.

India earned 10 penalty corners during the match, and converted five. The only positive for Kazakhstan in the game was its goalkeeper Guzal Bakhavaddin, who brought off a couple of penalty corner saves.

For India, ‘player of the match’ Jaspreet scored four goals, including the first penalty stroke of the competition, while Rani Rampal scored thrice and Soundarya Yendala got her name on the score sheet once.

India next plays Malaysia on Tuesday.

Earlier, tournament favourite Japan crushed Fiji 14-0 in the first match, scoring eight goals in the first half to make it a one-sided contest. As many as 10 different players scored for Japan. Shiho Sakai was adjudged ‘player of the match’ for her three goals.

In the day’s third contest for women, Malaysia scored a fighting 3-1 victory over higher-ranked Russia