Bob, the builder!

Rupinder Pal ‘Bob’ Singh is the architect of India’s 3-0 win over Spain as Men in Blue bounce back from Australia drubbing to inch closer to quarters spot

Dragflicker Rupinder Pal Singh (nicknamed Bob) scored a brace as the Indian men’s hockey overcame a demoralising defeat in the previous match to cruise past Spain 3-0 and inch closer to a quarter-final berth at the Tokyo Olympics on Tuesday.

Drubbed 1-7 by Australia in their last match, India produced a spirited performance against World No. 9 Spain and scored through Simranjeet Singh (14th minute) and Rupinder Pal Singh (15th and 51st) to record a comfortable win in their third Pool A match at the Oi Hockey Stadium.

India, ranked fourth in the world, had earlier defeated New Zealand 3-2 in their opening fixture. Spain, on the other hand, are yet to register a win in the competition.

Spain drew 1-1 against Argentina before losing 3-4 to New Zealand. The Indians will next play reigning Olympic champions Argentina on Thursday. For any team it is always tough to recover from a morale-shattering loss within a day, but India looked more organised and sorted against Spain.

Reid alert

Despite the win, India’s chief coach Graham Reid said the team need to work upon a lot of grey areas, like conceding penalty corners, ahead of their remaining matches. “Better result today, but a lot of things to work on from an improvement perspective. The fact that we gave too many corners, that’s always a concern when that happens. But the team did really well in terms of defending,” he said. “The first quarter was played very well, we could move the ball really well and it was exactly what we planned to do. We struggled a bit in the second and third quarters.” Manpreet Singh’s men played high pressure hockey from the word go and dominated the possession in initial 10 minutes even though they failed to create any real scoring opportunities. In the ninth minute, India came close to breaking the deadlock but Simranjeet’s deflection from skipper Manpreet sailed over the goal. 
 
Spain slowly and steadily got into the groove and secured their first penalty corner in the 12th minute but wasted the chance.

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Simranjeet scores

The Indians mounted number of attacks in the final few minutes of the game and the ploy bore fruit when Spain’s defence was caught off guard by Amit Rohidas’ pass and an unmarked Simranjeet just tapped the ball into the goal past Quico Cortes. 

The goal rejuvenated India as they secured three back-to-back penalty corners in the final minute of the first quarter and from the third set piece Harmanpreet’s flick found Spanish defender’s body, resulting in a penalty stroke.

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