Women’s Hockey Semi-Finals: India Fail To Retain Its Early Lead, Lose 1-2 To Argentina

Tokyo: After the men in blue, the Indian women’s hockey team also lost their semifinal to Argentina by 2-1 at Tokyo Olympics on Wednesday.

They will now play Great Britain for the bronze medal.

It was Argentina captain Maria Noel Barrionuevo’s brace that denied India a final berth. The team ruled the roost and bossed the midfield.

The Rani Rampal-led side, which had created history by shocking Australia in the quarterfinal, scored the first goal through a penalty corner in the first two minutes of the match against Argentina in the women’s hockey semi-finals.

Argentina began to attack right away at the beginning of the second quarter but was unable to convert any of the opportunities into a goal. However, they were third time lucky and a penalty corner helped them draw level at 1-1.

While Gurjit Kaur scored the opener in Q1 and Argentina equalised through skipper Barrionuevo in Q2.

India again earned a second penalty corner, but Gurjit fumbled this time and Argentina survived again.

The first half came to an end with the two teams tied at 1-1.

Barrionuevo again found the net in the 36th minute while India went down fighting.