Hangzhou/Hyderabad: The Indian women's hockey team has fired all its cylinders in its opening match with Singapore in the opening encounter in the Asian Games underway at China's Hangzhou on Wednesday. India scored 13 goals against a goalless Singapore, at the end of all four quarters.
Young striker Sangita Kumari slammed a hat-trick as a dominant India thrashed lowly Singapore in its opening Pool A match. The Indian side was on fire from the beginning striking the ball into the back of the net with their superior skills and fluent footwork. While the Indians pumped in as many as eight goals in the first two quarters, the Singaporeans did show some resistance after the halfway break as they conceded just five goals.
Udita opened the account for the Indian side in the 6th minute and Sushila Chanu continued the scoring momentum scoring the second goal in the eighth minute. Deepika extended the lead to 3-0 three minutes later while Navneet Kaur scored a brace to take India to a scoreline of 5-0 by the end of the first quarter. It was just the start of the domination by the Indian side and the gap kept widening as the play progressed.
Deep Grace Ekka converted a penalty corner in the second quarter while Neha and Sangita Kumari also played a role in stretching the lead. Sangita Kumari put in two more goals in the remaining passage of play while Vandana Katariya and Monica also added to the score sheet. India scored 13 goals by the end of the contest leaving Singapore's defence helpless against a rampant attack.
The Indian team will now face Malaysia in their next group fixture on Friday. The top two teams from each group will enter the semi-final and India will be aiming to advance into the tournament with ease.
"It was a good performance, we are happy with the result. The young girls complemented the seniors well. It made our job easy," skipper Savita said after the match. "We are taking match-by-match here. Our next focus is on Malaysia, we have a day gap in which we will prepare and study Malaysia's game. We will just focus on our plans.
"There is also Korea in our pool and they are a very good team but we will try to win and top the pool. Our mindset is right, everybody knows why they are here. Our target is to qualify (for the Olympics) directly," she added.
The gulf between India and Singapore was evident as the Savita Punia-led side mounted attack after attack to score eight goals in the opening two quarters. The Indians' relentless attacks resulted in a heap of penalty corners and they managed to convert five of them. (With PTI inputs)
