Hockey fraternity feeling elated

The hockey fraternity is elated at the fact that the Indian hockey team has been able to make it to the finals of the Commonwealth Games defeating a strong opponent like England in the semi-finals. However, it feels that India has to go all out if its wants to defeat World Cup winners Australia.

Talking to The Indian Express, Olympian Sujeet Kumar said, “ India played an attacking game today. If it is able to keep Australia under check during the first twenty minutes of the play in the final and the defenders are successful in keeping a ‘man-to-man’ check then the team has a chance of winning. It also has to be a lot more alert and not lose on a couple of good chances which it did today.”

Olympian Syed Ali, however, said that though he is happy with the fact that the team has been able reach the final, however, it did not play upto the mark in the first-half. “The team allowed England to attack and could not get penalty-corners. It has to go all out for defeating Australia in the final.” International hockey player Amit Prabhakar and SAI coach M Raza said that they expected the all-important encounter to be a keenly contested one.