Chile sucker-punch leaves Irish needing to beat Germany to keep dream alive
Ireland 0, Chile 1
Róisín Upton of Ireland is fouled by Camila Caram of Chile during the FIH Women's Hockey World Cup Pool A match at Wagener Stadium in Amstelveen. Photo by Patrick Goosen/Sportsfile
Ireland's Katie Mullan and coach Sean Dancer
Ireland will have to produce one of their biggest wins yet if they are to continue their World Cup journey following a defeat to debutantes Chile in Amstelveen.
It means they need to win against world No 5 side Germany (3.30pm, Irish time) and then hope goal difference works in their favour later when Chile meet the Netherlands.
It was a day in which Ireland could not get the best out of their penalty corner attack as 10 set-pieces went unconverted while the South American side whipped home the winner with 12 minutes to go via Denise Krimerman Losada.
Coach Sean Dancer was left to lament those chances as the crucial goal would not fall their way.
“Really disappointed,” he said afterwards. “We dominated the first half and couldn’t score; Chile had the best of the second half, particularly the third quarter so tough to concede and lose 1-0. Chile ran pretty good lines at the penalty corners and took away some of the things we wanted to do. We have to give them credit.”
Hannah McLoughlin concurred, adding: “It is definitely a game we targeted for three points and obviously haven’t got them. We have a 24-hour turnaround to our game against Germany so we need to park this one quickly, learn from it and get ready for tomorrow.”
The first three quarters were scoreless with Ireland unable to make full use of six corners while Chile were indisciplined, spending a third of the first half short-handed due to cards. Sarah Torrans deflected a first-minute chance into the bottom corner but Katie Mullan’s cross was deemed to have hit her back-stick.
Mullan then had a backhand shot test Claudia Schuler before the South American side endured their first sin-binnings with less than 10 minutes gone as passions threatened to boil over. Chile’s Domenica Ananias’ cross was then almost turned in by a diving Paula Valdivia. McLoughlin went closest to breaking the deadlock when she turned on her reverse-side and clipped a shot that nicked the outside of the left post.
The third quarter became scrappier but the game turned with 12 minutes to go when Chile picked off yet another set-piece and this time, Denise Krimerman Losada slapped hard and true to hit the backboard.
The Green Army responded, winning three more corners to no avail while Zara Malseed had a trio of shots on goal, all defended well. Life got harder still when Lena Tice was shown a yellow card and Róisín Upton took a blow to the head and, in the staccato finish, Chile held on.
Sarah Hawkshaw said the focus turns quickly to Germany:
“It is a huge [all-or-nothing] opportunity for us to put something away against them and I really believe we can.”
Ireland – A McFerran, M Carey, R Upton, S Hawkshaw, K Mullan, H McLoughlin, S Torrans, L Tice, C Perdue, D Duke, E Curran. Subs: S McAuley, Z Malseed, N Carroll, C Beggs, K McKee, C Hamill, L Murphy.
Germany v Ireland, live, RTÉ News Now/BT Sport 1, 3.30
