Bangladesh Team on India Radar for Asia Cup

On the back of a dominant 5-1 win over Japan, India will look to carry forward the momentum. They take on hosts Bangladesh in their second Pool A match of the men’s Asia Cup hockey tournament in Dhaka. Led by Manpreet Singh, the Indian team hardly broke a sweat during its win over Japan in its campaign opener yesterday. The only resistance was when Japan equalised in the fourth minute. Other than that, India sailed through the match. Now, India will take on the Bangladesh team in the second match of Pool A.

In their first tournament under Sjoerd Marijne, India meant business and found the net in each quarter and twice in the third. SV Sunil (3rd minute), Lalit Upadhyay (22nd), Ramandeep Singh (33rd) and Harmanpreet Singh (35th and 48th) were on target.

Looking ahead to the Challenge of the Bangladesh team

India will be hoping to build on the confidence they have gained from the first match and team’s the chief coach Sjoerd Marijne hopes that his players put on an improved show against the home team tomorrow.

He said “As a coach, I am always critical so I have to say I am not 100 per cent happy with how we played. I believe we can do better but this was our first match and now that the team is done with shaking off the initial jitters, I think we can focus on improved performance in the next game”.

Bangladesh Team on the Backfoot

Bangladesh suffered a humiliating 0-7 loss in their campaign opener against Pakistan yesterday, India will start as overwhelming favourites. India would look to stick to the basics and execute their plans well.

Marijne said “If we are able to do that (stick to our plans), then I don’t see why we should not win the match”. Sjoerd took charge of the team just last month following the sudden sacking of Roelant Oltmans.

Bangladesh skipper Rashel Mahmud said “We did not play a good match against Pakistan and made a lot of mistakes that led them to score so many goals. It was a bad start but we don’t want to let this loss affect our confidence. We will comeback as a better team against India,” the skipper had said after the match against Pakistan.