India captain Harmanpreet Singh on Thursday admitted that they had been under par and will have finished significantly better as the house group defeated a lowly Wales 4-2 to fail to high its pool and qualify immediately for the quarterfinals of the FIH Males’s World Cup.
India can nonetheless qualify for the quarterfinals in the event that they beat New Zealand of their crossover match on Sunday.
“We’re not glad with this win. This was not our greatest efficiency and we may have finished higher,” Harmanpreet mentioned on the post-match press convention.
Needing to win by a margin of eight targets to immediately qualify for the quarterfinals, India did not dwell as much as the expectations as they completed second in Pool D behind England.
Each India and England ended their group engagements on seven factors every after successful two matches and drawing one however the European facet topped Pool D on the idea of superior objective distinction.
England, who had outclassed Spain 4-0 within the earlier Pool D match right here, have a greater objective distinction of plus 9 as in opposition to India’s 4.
When two groups are on similar factors and gained equal variety of matches, the rating is determined by objective distinction.
“We created possibilities however one way or the other we couldn’t rating too many targets. We hope to do higher in opposition to New Zealand,” the captain, who scored his first objective from a penalty nook, added.
Head coach Graham Reid rued the dearth of ending by the forwards, which continued from their drawn match in opposition to England on January 15.
“We performed effectively in patches and Wales defended effectively. They (Wales) are a great group and in the event you give possibilities to them, they are going to rating. England had additionally made our job more durable,” Reid mentioned, as England’s 4-0 win over Spain put India below stress.
“I believed we nonetheless made lots of possibilities however the ending was nonetheless missing which was probably the most disappointing half. Wales defended effectively. There isn’t a simple strategy to gold medal on this World Cup and each group is completely different. There have been positives we are able to take from right now’s match.” The Australian mentioned New Zealand is not going to be simple opponents within the crossover match as India had came upon within the two FIH Professional League matches right here final yr.
“The primary match (of Professional League) was a troublesome one whereas the second was a bit simpler. New Zealand is not going to be simple opponents,” Reid mentioned.
India had overwhelmed New Zealand 4-3 within the first match and 7-4 within the reverse recreation of the Professional League on October 28 and November 4 final yr respectively.
On Hardik Singh, who missed Thursday’s match as a result of a hamstring damage, Reid mentioned, “We’ll take a choice on January 21 whether or not he’ll keep or not. He’s bettering day-to-day so fingers crossed.
“However having a participant much less right now was not the difficulty, we performed with 16 gamers in Tokyo Olympics.”