17 Jul 2010

Men's hockey team beaten 5-1

1:36 pm on 17 July 2010

The New Zealand men's hockey team have been beaten 5-1 by Great Britain in the Four-Nations tournament in Nottingham.

Britain was disorganised in the backfield during the first 20 minutes, and New Zealand's young talent put a lot of pressure on the defence, but were unable to convert that into scoring chances.

Britain started to dominate the midfield after finding their feet in defence, intercepting New Zealand's passes and turning possession into attack.

Britain took a 3-nil lead into half-time, but five minutes after the break New Zealand's Marcus Child scored a soft goal to take the score to 3-1.

But it wasn't enough, and Britain continued to turn their possession intio scoring opportunites, and scored twice more before full-time.

The New Zealand coach, Shane McLeod, says New Zealand was out-played, with Britain playing a physical game which they struggled to compete with.

McLeod's brought an inexperienced side to Europe, with nine players under 21 years of age, in order to expose the younger players to international hockey before next month's Champion's Trophy tournament.

The Black Sticks will play Japan for the bronze medal tomorrow morning.

They lost 3-4 to Japan in their round robin match.