Mixed results for Ireland’s Olympic hockey hopefuls against Ukraine and Belgium
Ireland's Sarah Torrans
Ireland’s women had seven different scorers in a dominant 8-0 routing of Ukraine to lift them into top spot of Pool A as their Olympic qualification campaign continued in Spain yesterday.
After their opening 0-0 draw with Belgium in Valencia and this win, Ireland are well positioned progress to the knock-out stages ahead of today’s final game against South Korea
The top two sides in each pool qualify for the semi-finals, with the two finalists and the third-placed team sealing their place in to Paris.
Ireland made a good cause for their Olympic inclusion when Sarah Torrans opened the scoring in the 19th minute before Niamh Carey added a second goal before half-time.
The floodgates then opened as Hannah McLoughlin, Deirdre Duke, Róisín Upton, Beth Harper and Katie Mullan were on target while Torrans’ second completed the rout.
Meanwhile, the men’s campaign suffered a setback with a 4-2 defeat to the world No 2-ranked side Belgium in their second Pool A game in Spain.
Ireland were playing catch-up throughout much of this encounter but Ben Johnson struck a goal after 21 minutes to ensure they trailed 3-1 at half-time.
Matthew Nelson would add another consolation goal for Ireland in the dying stages but Belgium had done enough by that stage.
The men in green can still make the top two, which will seal their place in the semi-finals, when facing Japan tomorrow in their final pool game.
“Scoring the goals today was very pleasing,” said Ireland head coach Sean Dancer.
“It’s great when the conversion rate of scoring opportunities is high. Scoring goals is a key part of the game and it was very pleasing to see a number of different players get on the scoresheet.
“The build-up play for some of the goals was based on good attacking play and that was another pleasing aspect of today’s performance.
"Our set-pieces and penalty corners worked well today too, but conceding zero goals too, is almost as important as scoring goals.”
In Pool B, Spain beat Great Britain to make it two wins from two.
Canada got back on track with a 3-0 win over Malaysia following their previous 2-0 defeat to Great Britain, while Malaysia had their second defeat against Canada having lost 7-0 to Spain on the opening day of Pool B.
