Dutch coach relieved to reach semis despite loss

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New Delhi, March 9 – Dutch coach Michel van den Heuvel was relieved his team made the semis despite their 1-2 loss to Asian champions Korea in their last Pool A match of the Hockey World Cup here Tuesday.

‘We are happy to reach the semis. We played a very good first half. The second half completely belonged to the South Koreans. We didn’t balanced the game in both the halves and lost control in the last 15 minutes,’ said Huevel, after the Netherlands’ fourth consecutive loss to the Koreans.

Koreans were desperate for a win by a margin of two goals which would have taken them to the last four stage.

‘You can only control the Koreans when you have the ball. But our positional play was not good,’ said Huevel

‘But we are in the semis and that is what matters.’

The Netherlands will be facing hot favourites Australia in the semis and Huevel said they will have to be at their best.

‘Australia brings a lot of speed and power in the game. We have to be very careful against them.’

South Korean coach Kyo Seok Shin was understandably disappointed. ‘We played better and deserved to win by a better margin. We didn’t stop the gaps and that allowed them to continue their passing game.’

Shin also said the Koreans were unable to prepare well for the World Cup.

‘We had a heavy snow fall in Korea and had we prepared better I think the results would have been different,’ he said.

IANS