HWL: Don't want to see such below-par performance again, says Oltmans after Argentina defeat

Raipur: Roelant Oltmans was fuming after a lacklustre India lost 0-3 to Argentina in the opening match of the Hockey World League (HWL) Final, prompting the Dutchman to say he doesn’t want to witness a repeat of such a “below-par” showing from his wards in the rest of the tournament. Oltmans, chief coach of the Indian team, said the hosts were completely outplayed by a better Argentina team on the field today at the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Stadium here. [caption id=“attachment_2372420” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  File picture of Roelant Oltmans (L). AFP[/caption] “For me the result is not important, for me what is important is performance and today our performance was by far below-par the level that we normally can show. The performance was really insufficient today,” Oltmans minced no words while criticising his players. “If they continue to commit such errors in the rest of the tournament then it’s a serious concern. But still what I saw today I don’t want to see it anymore. “From my point of view we didn’t stick to our game. Argentina is a team who likes to defend and rely on fast counter attacks. They didn’t allow us to come to their circle too often apart from the fourth quarter. Argentina was clearly the better side today,” he added. The Dutchman, who is also the High Performance Director of India hockey, termed his side’s performance as “disappointing”. “I think the players know they can play better than what they showed today. When you play the first match of the tournament you want to play your best hockey,” Oltmans said. “It was a disappointment conceding early goal. That was unnecessary and it looked like we failed to overcome that situation till the dying moments of the first half when he had the first shot at the goal. “We went back and back and failed to go forward. In the second half we tried to go forward. In the second half we created more but still it was not enough to win against Argentina. It was a disappointing game from our point of view. But the good part is in this format we can afford that,” he said analysing India’s performance. India conceded nine penalty corners three of which were converted by the Argentines. If that was not enough, India managed to secure just one set piece but failed to utilise it. “I am not too concerned about penalty corners I am more concerned about our all over performance,” Oltmans said. India will play Olympic champions Germany tomorrow in their second match of Pool B tomorrow. “In 24 hours we play Germany, another tough match. Germany is a very strong and we have a very tough pool.” India captain Sardar Singh was of the view that there was no co-ordination between the players. “We didn’t execute our plans. Energy level was lacking in our performance. There was no communication and co-ordination between the players. We need to show fighting spirit till 60 minutes because we will get these sort games in Rio Olympics,” he said. PTI