FIH Pro League 2022: Indian hockey team's Nilakanta Sharma says team's finishing could be better
The Indian men's hockey team finished their FIH Pro League home engagements on a high after taking all six points in their last two matches against Germany.
India beat Germany 3-0 in their first match and won 3-1 in their second match at the Kalinga Stadium on Friday, April 15.
Harmanpreet Singh scored a brace and Abhishek scored one goal in the first match. Whereas a goal each from Sukhjeet Singh (19'), Varun Kumar (41') and Abhishek (54') helped India seal the win in the second.
Anton Boeckel (45') was the lone scorer for Germany in the second match.
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Nilakanta Sharma was awarded the 'Player of the Match' in the second encounter. After the match, he admitted that despite the result, there are a lot of finer points that the team would like to work on.
“It’s good to win both games but I think our finishing could be better and we have a long break before our next match, so we will work on it and do better in our next game," Nilakanta Sharma said after the match.
Germany elated with performance so far in FIH Pro League
The German side are a relatively young side with many players still in their infancy in their international careers. Although the team lost both their matches against India in the FIH Pro League, German captain Martin Zwicker praised his young team. He said his team was in the hunt right till the final hooter.
“We were right there till the end. A two-goal deficit was a bit much, but for the most part of the match we were down by only one goal, and to do that with a young team like this is great. We will take a lot of positives from these two matches. We wanted some points from these games, which we haven’t succeeded in doing. But an improved second game is a good sign for sure," Zwicker said after the match.
The FIH Pro League action from the 2021-22 season concludes in India. It will now move to Argentina for the next set of matches in both women’s and men’s season of the FIH Pro League.
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