Jr Hockey World Cup: India coach Reid blames his players’ poor habits for their defeat

Bhubaneswar : November 24, 2009 - Graham Reid, the chief coach of Indian mens hockey, blamed his players poor skills and missed opportunities for Wednesdays shocking 4-5 defeat by France in the first match of the FIH ODH Hockey Mens Junior Cup at the Kalinga Stadium.

He claimed that India was paying the price for allowing France to lose balls in their half.The French players were the ones who scored the goal "It is very difficult to give five goals to a team and expect them to win.I felt we had enough opportunities.After the match, Reid stated that we made some basic mistakes, including trapping and overheads.

He also said that we missed some overheads and hit the post 2-3 times.One shot crossed the goal.

" "We need to put more pressure on the ball.We didnt do that.France deserves our congratulations.

They played well and wanted to win today.Our guys were also keen to win and did everything they could.

He added that things didnt go as planned tonight.Reid spoke out about the lack of coordination between his players in their first match.

He said that it was difficult to have coordination when players are making mistakes in basics "It is difficult to get coordination if you dont know the basics.We gave them too many easy passes deep in our territory at the back.

We gave them a few chances today, but the French scored all of them.Reid said that although I dont know how many shots they had, almost all of them were on goal.

Reid claimed that his team was unable to prepare due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but this was also true for other teams.No competitions were held for this age group in the last year "All teams suffered from that gap between 2020 and 2020 when we didnt get enough competition with this group, when we didnt have international competitions because of the COVID pandemic.

He said that Europe was probably more open, but that we cannot use that as an excuse." The Australian coach of Indias team dismissed the idea that his players couldnt play their normal game.

He explained that they were playing matches against senior teams during preparations for the Tokyo Olympics.They played their normal game and could have won the match had they not made mistakes in basics and missed 2-3 chances.

Reid spoke out about the upcoming matches and said that they would have to put more pressure on the ball, and not allow opponents too many chances.bsk/c #Hockey #World #India #coach #Reid #blames.