The Americans lost their quarterfinal match to Germany on Monday. The Americans were never really favorites in the field hockey event, but wins over field hockey giants Argentina (no. 2) and Australia (no. 3), showed that the United States team could stand their ground in the sport.
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The men’s hockey gold medal at Rio 2016 will be contested by two first time finalists in Argentina and Belgium, meaning that a brand new Olympic champion is now a certainty following an astonishing day of semi-finals action at the Deodoro Hockey Centre.
Argentina humiliate defending hockey champions Germany was posted in Sports of TheNews International – https://www.thenews.com.pk on August 16, 2016 and was last updated on August 16, 2016.
And not the Netherlands, which had never lost to its Belgian neighbor in major competition, but saw that 80-year streak terminated 3-1. We knew what we needed to do to beat Australia.
Before the final on Thursday, Germany and the Netherlands, the finalists in London, will play for bronze. This secures their semifinal spot against Germany which will also be played on Wednesday.
Lucas Vila then made it 5-0 with a field goal to put an exclamation mark on Argentina’s progression to the Rio 2016 Olympic Games final, before Germany scored two late consolation goals through Moritz Furste and Christopher Ruhr. That’s when Germany replaced its goalie for an extra forward to try and limit the roasting. According to team captain Kayla Whitelock, they are just starting to click.
“We came into the tournament hopeful of getting on the podium but were unable to achieve that”, added coach Parnham. “We couldn’t stop and congratulate ourselves”.
Not until the last minute did Argentina coach Carlos Retegui, responsible for numerous women’s triumphs, finally accept he’d masterminded the men’s greatest success yet, and began hugging his assistants.
Like Argentina, the Belgians are a veteran team, even more so. It’s criminal to give away three goals in 4 minutes 36 seconds, especially two goals in the last 48 seconds.
They punched their ticket to Rio at last year’s Pan American Games, with a 2-1 victory over Argentina.
The PA system broke down, so the national anthems couldn’t be played. “Hopefully, we’ve inspired a few young Americans to get into the sport, pick up a stick and increase our number of player base”. Mink van der Weerden reduced the deficit a minute before half time, but the result was put beyond all doubt by Florent van Aubel early in the fourth quarter, who guided the ball home after being perfectly supplied by the inspirational Thomas Briels to give Belgium one of the finest results in their history.
Belgium continued to cut through midfield, set up chances, while strangling the favorites.
Boon said, “It’s unbelievable we were better than them”.
This could be bad news for Team GB, but the undefeated squad has been playing some of its best hockey ever, not to mention at the right time. “We showed our Belgian hearts”.
“We are doing the ideal tournament, the tournament for life and it s at the right moment, at the Olympics”.
It was the first time the Leonas have failed to reach the semifinals in an Olympic Game, a World Cup, a Champions Trophy or a World League final since 1998.
The Black Sticks women’s quarter-final match against the Hockeyroos played out just as Anita Mclaren had envisioned. “The moment when it counted we were unbelievably lucky”.
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“We’ve been building through this tournament and I’m excited about what we can do”. The Netherlands will face Germany to compete for the bronze.
