Rio 2016 | India defeat Argentina to inch towards quarters

After suffering an agonising last-minute defeat against Germany yesterday, World No.5 India faced World No.7 Argentina as they looked to keep their hopes of a quarter-final place alive. India went into the match as the fourth-placed team in the group with three points from two games, while Argentina was third with four points from two games.

India continued their dominance in the rest of the quarter, but in the last minute before the quarter, India had a lucky escape. VR Raghunath received a green card and India were down to 10 men. The Argentines used the opportunity to attack and almost put the ball into the net, only to see it rebounding back off the post.

India’s defence has been error-prone in the past, but today VR Raghunath raised the game for the match against Argentina and kept the defence tight. The team also pressed high up the pitch and troubled the Argentines to enforce mistakes.

After going into the half-way mark with a 1-0 lead, Kothajit Singh doubled India’s lead in the 34th minute. India harried the Argentine defender in the right corner, and after a scramble, they won the ball. Akashdeep Singh employed some nice stick work to send the ball back into the circle and Ramandeep Singh took a shot at the goal. But he failed to connect properly and the ball fell to Kothajit Singh. He made no mistake and smashed it to the right of the goalie to make it 2-0.

India last beat Argentina back in 2009, and it looked like they would register their first win in a long time. However, Argentina came out for the fourth quarter as a different team and unleashed attack after attack on the Indian goal. They won their first penalty corner in the 48th minute, and it give Gonzallo Peillat a chance to unleash his powerful penalty corners. Peillat stepped up and unleashed a straightforward low drive to the bottom left corner to beat PR Sreejesh.

Argentina had their first goal and they pushed for more. The Indian defence, which had stood tall for the first three quarters, conceded penalty corner after penalty corner in the fourth. But, PR Sreejesh was a wall before the goal and kept Argentina out with some incredible saves. Although Argentina pushed forward over and over, India held their nerves in the last minute and held on for a 2-1 win to move to second position in the table.