Women’s Hockey World Cup: India falter against New Zealand, will play in crossovers

An extravagant Indian women's team lost to New Zealand in their 3rd Pool B match but managed to qualify for the crossovers at FIH Hockey World Cup on Thursday.

A barrage of Penalty corners was missed by the Savita Punia-led team who went down fighting 3-4 against New Zealand. However, the team will play in the crossover after securing the third spot in their group.

After a solid start with Vandana Katariya scoring the opening goal of the game in the 4th minute, things went awry for the Women in Blue.

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Katariya's goal was levelled by Olivia Merry who scored in the 12th and later in the 54th minute of the game. Tessa Jopp and Frances Davies further strengthened NZ's lead with goals in the 29th and 32nd minute, respectively.

Lalremsiami and Gurjit Kaur scored a goal each in the 44th and 59th minutes. Still, as many as 15 penalty corner misses including 2 in the last minutes of the game hurt India's chances for a direct quarterfinal ticket.

India will next play host Spain in Crossovers on 10th July to secure a quarterfinal spot. Crossover games are held for the final 4 quarterfinal spots.