Hockey: Ireland open World Cup campaign with defeat to Netherlands

Netherlands 5 Ireland 1

Four years after their World Cup odyssey in London ended in defeat to the Netherlands in the final, Ireland opened their 2022 campaign by losing to the same opposition in front of a crowd of 9,000 in Amsterdam on Saturday, the Dutch starting their quest for a third World Cup in a row with a 5-1 victory.

It was a chastening enough scoreline in the end for Ireland, but they’ll take heart from the gutsiest of first half defensive displays when they restricted the tournament’s co-hosts to a single goal from a penalty stroke.

Four goals in 11 second half minutes, though, saw the Dutch finally convert their dominance in to scores, although Roisin Upton briefly gave Ireland hope in the third quarter when a characteristically excellent drag from the team’s only penalty corner of the game halved the Netherland’s 2-0 lead.

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With just five survivors from their 2018 team still on board, a new look Ireland, for whom Caoimhe Perdue started to make her official debut, with Charlotte Beggs, Katie McKee and Christina Hamill all coming on to win their first caps, were never fancied to trouble the side who are also reigning Olympic champions.

And while they were restricted to just one effort on goal in the first half, Sarah Torrans’ reverse strike going wide of the left post, they succeeded in frustrating the Dutch at the other end, Ayeisha McFerran showing much the same form that won her the goalkeeper of the tournament award in 2018.

But it was McFerran’s upending of Maria Verschoor, after she had been brilliantly put through by Yibbi Jansen, that led to the Dutch breaking the deadlock in the 17th minute, Frédérique Matla burying the resulting penalty stroke.

That, though, was the only score of a first half that saw the Dutch win seven penalty corners, have nine shots on target and 25 circle penetrations, but finding themselves repeatedly thwarted by McFerran and courageous blocking of corner strikes.

But Jansen made it 2-0 early in the second quarter from their eighth penalty corner, before Michelle Carey earned the corner from which Upton converted.

But another penalty corner strike, this time from Sabine Plönissen, followed by Matla’s second penalty stroke of the game three minutes later, after McFerran felled Felice Albers, all but sealed the game for the Dutch, Verschoor scoring their first goal from play in the final quarter to make it 5-1.

The end-of-game stats — 18 shots on goal to one, 13 penalty corners to one — told the tale of that Dutch domination, but defensively at least, there was enough in the Irish display to give them confidence going in to Tuesday’s game against Chile, the lowest ranked team in the tournament.

Chile lost 4-1 to Germany in pool A’s other game on Saturday, the Germans Ireland’s opponents in their final pool game on Wednesday.

Ireland: A McFerran, H McLoughlin, R Upton, L Tice, E Curran, S Hawkshaw, C Perdue, M Carey, S Torrans, K Mullan (capt), D Duke. Subs: E Murphy, S McAuley, Z Malseed, N Carroll, C Beggs, K McKee, C Hamill.

Netherlands: A Veenendaal, P Sanders, L Nunnink, S Koolen, R Van Laarhoven, M Van Geffen, X de Waard (capt), F Albers, L Welten, L Leurink, F Matla. Subs: F Moes, M Keetels, M Verschoor, J Koning, E De Goede, S Plonissen, Y Jansen.

Umpires: H Y Kang (Korea) and M Giddens (USA).