Bhubaneswar,
The 15th edition of the ICC World Cup between 16 teams is being played at the Kalinga Stadium in Bhubaneswar, Odisha. At the end of the league round, the Indian team, who finished 2nd in the ‘D’ division, wrestled with New Zealand, who got the 3rd position in the ‘C’ division, in the 2nd round last night.
It was expected that India, ranked 6th in the world, would play against a team that was 6 places behind them. But contrary to the prediction, New Zealand countered in every way and the field heated up from the first second.
The Indian players had a strong 3-1 lead at one stage. Upadhyay (17th minute), Sukhjeet Singh (24th minute) and Varun Kumar (40th minute) scored. But the Indian players could not maintain the lead till the end.
New Zealand’s Mark Russell in the 43rd minute and Cian Bintley in the 49th minute converted penalty corner chances to tie the game. Following this, India squandered two consecutive penalty corner chances in the last half. After this, in the last minute, the shot by New Zealander Sam Lane was saved by the Indian goalkeeper.
The game ended in a 3-3 draw at the end of regular 60 minutes. A penalty shoot-out was followed to determine the winner.
As the tie continued (3-3) in the penalty shoot-out, sudden death was introduced. According to the sudden death system, both the teams will be given one chance each. If one team scores and the other team fails to score, the game is stopped.
But sudden death is not over with one shot. The tension rose as both teams took turns scoring or conceding. In the end, the New Zealand team defeated the Indian team 5-4 and entered the quarter-finals. The Indian team, which lost the opportunity to the next round, will now play the match for the 9th to 12th place.
After winning the World Cup in 1975, the Indian team has not even made it to the top 4 in the World Cup in the last 48 years. The half-century-long tragedy continues this time too.