Birmingham: The Indian women’s hockey team started their campaign at the Commonwealth Games with a victory by defeating a lower-ranked Ghana 5-0, here today. The Savita Punia-led side however did not look so impressive in their first pool ‘A’ match.
For the team, Gurjit Kaur scored two goals in the third and 39th minutes while Neha Goel scored in the 28th minute, Sangeeta Kumari in the 36th minute and Salima Tete scored the field goals in the 56th minute. India dominated all departments of the match but their performance in the first two quarters was poor during which Ghana’s defence put up a strong performance to frustrate a team ranked higher than them
The most frustrating part for India has been the weak link between the mid field and the front line. The practice of not converting a penalty corner into a goal also continued and the Indian team could convert only one penalty corner out of 10 chances into a goal. There was hope in this contest that the Indian team would win by a big margin but Ghana goalkeeper Abigail Boye kept his team in the match with some brilliant saves in which his backline also gave him full support. India will now take on Wales in their second match of the pool on July 30.