Having ensured the final berth even before stepping onto the turf, India had just one unaccomplished task — choose their final opponents for the all-important clash on Sunday.
Aware that France had already shut the door on Canada earlier in the day by holding them to a 1-1 draw, India had their task cut out.
Thus, the only unanswered question was: Who will India choose as their opponents for Sunday’s final? Poland who once spoiled India’s Olympic mission in the 2000 Sydney Olympics? Or France, an easier bet?
The answer came right towards the end, with hosts the edging past Poland 4-2 to set up a summit clash with France. It was a display of well-calculated hockey.
Spending the first few minutes only lapping around, the real battle for India only began in the 13th minute after Poland stunned them by converting their first penalty corner through Tomasz Dutkiewicz.
It was like an alarm bell for India; and suddenly there was a different team.
It was once again star drag flicker Sandeep Singh’s turn to score the equaliser before the lemon break by converting the fourth penalty corner.
The second-half was a mixture of aggression and restrained hockey as both teams probably thought of settling the score on Sunday. As the draw was enough for Poland to go through by virtue of their better goal difference over France, they also showed a wait-and-watch policy towards the middle of the second half.
It cost them dear as India kept pushing for a match-winning goal and succeeded in putting one across the Polish net with a smart deflection from Shivendra Singh. The credit should go to Saravanjit Singh who dodged past at least two Polish defenders before setting it up for his colleague.
Now it was Poland’s turn to equalise after three minutes as Miroslaw Juszczak scooped it past Indian skipper Bharat Chetri in the goalpost.
Now the verdict was out as far as the Indian camp was concerned. Play France and dump Poland.
The pace was back in the match. Indian forwards were working in tandem and this took the Polish defence by surprise. Raghunath chipped in for Sandeep this time and made no mistake of converting the penalty corner to make it 3-2. In the dying seconds, Sandeep converted the penalty corner to take his tournament tally to 11.
“It’s good that we maintained our winning run and now we will have to repeat the same good performance once again on Sunday. We have been playing consistently well and that’s what matters to me,” India coach Michael Nobbs said.
With France getting the final confirmation for Sunday’s outing, their skipper Arnaud Becuwe said: “It was one of our best efforts in recent times. We were a better side against Canada and I am proud of my team.”
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