She is proud of the effort but Indian women’s hockey team captain Rani Rampal is hurting as well after coming within touching distance of a historic Olympic podium finish only to finish fourth ultimately. The Indians, beating all expectations, entered the semi-finals of the Games for the first time, and signed off with a fourth-place finish after going down to Great Britain 3-4 in the bronze medal play-off here on Friday.

“We are feeling so disappointed because we were so close. And we were 2-0 down and then we equalised, and we were 3-2 up. I don’t know what to say, but yeah it hurts a lot because we couldn’t win the bronze medal,” she said after the heart-breaking loss.