The Indian Women’s hockey team is all set to clash swords against Argentina on the 18th and 19th of June in the FIH Hockey Pro League. The doubled header between these two teams will be very crucial in determining the positions in the standings. The Indian eves are in third position in the standings with 22 points from 10 matches whereas Argentina women’s team are at the summit with 38 points from 14 matches.
It is an opportunity and challenge at the same time for Savita Punia’s girls to show up against one of the best teams in the world and go toe to toe with them. It will be an assessment of their own abilities ahead of the FIh Women’s Hockey World Cup next month in the Netherlands and Spain.
Savita highlighted how India needs to keep in mind the match they played against Argentina in the semifinals of the Olympics last year as they gave a good fight. Speaking ahead of their matches against Argentina, the Indian captain Savita Punia said, “Our preparations are going on well. We had two great training sessions and everyone has focused on improving their game. We are looking forward to our matches against Argentina and looking to perform as a team and as individuals. We are quite confident ahead of the matches as we played a good game against Argentina in the Semi-Final of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.”
Penalty corners is an area where the Indian Eves need to improve a lot or else they will be under pressure as the South American are deadly from penalty corners. Savita has shed light on the players training and especially working very hard to improve their penalty corner regime. He is hopeful that the training will reflect on the pitch in match situations. “We are working on improving our execution with regards to Penalty Corners. During our practice sessions, the players trained with the best mindset and worked on earning Penalty Corners and executing shots on goal. Hopefully, the players will improve upon executing Penalty Corners in our upcoming matches as well.”
On the other hand vice captain and experienced veteran Deep Grace Ekka is fully confident that the team is ready to take on Argentina as she feels that the girls have understood their mistakes in the past and have learned from them. “We have learned a lot about our own games during our practice sessions after our matches against Belgium. We have corrected the mistakes we made in our previous matches and we are fully prepared for our next challenge.”
