India ends its FIH Pro League campaign on a winning note

India ended its FIH Pro League 2023 campaign on a winning note. In its last match of the League, India defeated Pan American champions Argentina 2-1, to maintain its position at the top of the table.

In 16 matches in the League, India won 8 games and scored 51 goals and conceded 42 to finish with 30 points. As of now Great Britain is placed at number 2 position with 26 points and has four more games to play.

It was for the second successive match of the League that India played without its skipper Harmanpreet Singh. Hardik Singh led the team in his absence. Interestingly, in this game which India won by two first quarter field goals, it did not earn even a single penalty corner against five by the Pan Americans. It was from the fifth and last penalty corner that Argentina reduced the margin. Lucas Toscani was the scorer.

India started from where it left in the last game. Arshdeep Singh had the Argentina defence surprised with an opening minute brilliant field goal. And before the first quarter ended Sukhjeet Singh consolidated the lead for his second goal against Argentina in as many matches.

Leading 2-0 at the breather, India enjoyed slightly better exchanges in the second half but was unable to get past the Argentina defence. The Pan Americans resorted to man to man and total zone packing allowing little or restricted movement to Indian forwards as Arshdeep, Sukhjeet, Lalit and Mandeep did try to make deep forays into the territory of their opponents.

In the fourth quarter, Argentina forced a series of penalty corners. From the fifth and last penalty corners, it managed to salvage some pride with Lucas meeting the target.