Samsung FIH Champions Trophy: England Upset Argentina, Germany and Netherlands win
Germany, England and Netherlands won their matches on the opening day of the Samsung FIH Champions Trophy, scheduled from 10 - 18th July, 2010 in Nottingham, England. The Germans won a tough match against a dominating Chinese side by defeating them 2 goals to 1. In the second match of the day, the English team shocked the defending champions Argentina with a hard-earned 2 -1 victory. In the last match of the day, Olympic Champions Netherlands defeated the newcomers New Zealand by 3-1.
In the opening match of the tournament between Germany and China, the Chinese side started the match as the brighter side, and kept attacking the German goal post where Tina Bachmann, Captain of the German side, was giving tough resistance to the Chinese forwards. Xu Xiaoxu scored the first goal for her side, as well as her first in the Champions Trophy, when she placed the ball in the German post in the 9th minute of the match. It was a beautiful reverse stick shot which hit the bottom of the goal. After the first goal, the Germans built some momentum and start attacking the Chinese goal and scored an equalizer in the 17th minute of the play when Eileen Hoffmann deflected the ball into the top of the goal post. At the end of the first half, the match was levelled at 1-1. Both sides aggressively started the second half and kept attacking each other’s goal, but it was Eileen Hoffmann again who scored the second goal for the German side in the 55th minute. The Asian side tried to equalize the lead, but couldn’t end up scoring a goal. Germany won this match and got all three points from the game. The Chinese side should not be disappointed from this loss, as they put up a good show but unfortunately lost the match.
In the second match of the day, the home side surprised the defending Champions Argentina and gave their crowd something to be happy about after their men’s football team couldn’t put up a good show at the FIFA World Cup. The English team, with an advantage of the home crowd and favourable conditions, started the match well. In the 12th minute of the match, the home side took the lead when its forward Hannah Macleod scored on a diving deflection. With this goal, the home side gained confidence and its goalkeeper Beth Storry saved a wonderful attempt by world’s # 1 Luciana Aymar. At the end of the first half, the score was 1-0. In the second half of the match, the Argentine side tried hard to equalize, but they couldn’t. In the 55th minute of the play, Alex Danson doubled the lead on a penalty corner awarded to them. Just three minutes later, Noel Barrionuevo minimized the lead that gave some hope to the visitors, but thanks to the heroics of Beth Storry, England won the much deserving match, which left a lot of critics declaring the win a major upset.
In the last match of the day, the Netherlands were against the minnows New Zealand. Despite being the lowest ranked team in the Champions Trophy, the Black Sticks were hard to beat. Netherlands was awarded two penalty corners which its specialist Maartje Paumen failed to convert into goals. The first half was a goalless, where both sides played wonderful hockey, but Netherlands was on top. With the start of the second half, both teams tried to get the advantage but couldn’t. The first goal of the match came from the Kiwis when Clarissa Eshuis converted a penalty corner into a goal in the 47th minute of the match. Just minutes after conceding a goal, the Olympic Champions scored an equalizer when Eva De Goede scored a field goal. The Dutch side started attacking with new enthusiasm, and in the 67th minute of the match, Paumen scored a much awaited goal on penalty corner that surely dimmed the chances of the Black Sticks. In the last minute of the game, Kim Lammers scored the third goal for the Dutch side to win the match by 3 goals to one. The score line, however, may not tell us how well the Kiwis played against the favourites.
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