Inaugural FIH Nations Cup champions South Africa could have a troublesome job forward to win this version in Poland after a gap day defeat in opposition to Austria.
Beginning with out skipper Dayaan Cassiem, attributable to journey points, South Africa had been nonetheless fancied in opposition to Austria who started life with out Korper and Stanzl. It began fantastically for the South Africans who produced an impressive assault after a elegant ball from Matt Guise-Brown. Bili Ntuli was discovered on the finish of the piece and delayed his shot completely for the keeper to commit and dink it over him into the web.
The South African Engine was nicely and really purring and the inevitable second purpose got here within the sixth minute as Matt Guise-Brown fired dwelling a scintillating drag flick and the African Olympic Qualifiers had been nicely on their manner.
To their credit score the Austrian’s settled into the sport and pulled a purpose again by Julian Kaiser from a penalty nook. The opening quarter ended 2-1 to the Africans.
The second quarter was good for the Europeans as their set piece weaponry made it depend changing each their penalty corners within the quarter to take a 3-2 lead on the half time interval. Losonci had restored parity within the 20th minute earlier than Maximilian Scholz gave Austria the lead within the 26th minute.
The third quarter noticed two penalty corners that may simply discover their place on an ideal.com web site as first Scholz fired an unstoppable drive previous Kriek in objectives for SA earlier than Guise-Brown improved on it with a rocket to make it 4-3. 6 penalty corners transformed out of seven set the sport up for a incredible end.
South Africa had probabilities with 4 penalty corners however had been unable to make them depend within the last probabilities whereas Keenan Horne created an incredible alternative however was unable to transform and in the end the South Africans settled for a defeat of their opener.
Keenan Horne, crew captain on the day, shared his ideas submit recreation:
“It’s a disappointing begin, we need to win the primary recreation however having stated that we all know it’s the primary recreation. We have to flip it on within the subsequent recreation and go from there. I believe there have been too many unforced errors which harm within the strategy to construct up play.”
The SA Males are subsequent in motion in opposition to fellow Olympic Qualifiers New Zealand on Monday at 18:00 native time.
