Buenos Aires (Argentina), 12 October 2018: The Indian U-18 Men’s Hockey Team continued to impress at the Buenos Aires 2018 Youth Olympic Games as they defeated Poland 4-2 in their Quarter-Final match held here at the Parque Polideportivo Roca on Friday and progress to the Semi-Finals of the fast-paced Hockey 5s competition. India’s well fought victory saw Shivam Anand (1′, 8′) score twice as Maninder Singh (3′) and Sanjay (17′) also registered their names on the score-sheet. Poland’s goals were scored by Eryk Bembenek (16′) and Michal Nowakowski (18′).
India started the match well and rocketed to a 2-0 lead inside the first three minutes as Forward Shivam Anand scored the first goal within 48 seconds of the beginning while Midfielder Maninder Singh scored the second in the 3rd minute after fellow team-mate Sudeep Chirmako had missed the target in the 2nd minute. Poland, on the other hand, did not back down and forced Indian Goalkeeper Prashant Chauhan to make four brilliant saves in the first period. India’s Shivam Anand made sure that Poland went into the half-time break three goals down as the Indian scored his second of the match in the 7th minute and help his team dominate the encounter.
The second period saw Poland produce some more shots at the Indian goal which helped them in pulling a goal back in the 16th minute through Eryk Bembenek, who scored after several attempts were wasted by his teammates. However, India’s Sanjay helped his team in restoring the three-goal advantage as he scored past Polish Goalkeeper Jakub Gebler to make the scoreline 4-1. The Polish team tried to create more chances to turn the match around and found a second goal in the 18th minute which was scored by Michal Nowakowski, but it turned out to be too little, too late for the Europeans as India secured their passage through to the Semi-Finals of the competition.
The Indian U-18 Men’s Hockey team will face the winner of the Quarter-Final match between hosts Argentina and Bangladesh.
India will be playing their Semi-Final match on 13th October 2018 from 22.30hrs IST onwards.
