Sport Features

A Big Hockey Hola!

Friday 29th September

Today's game against the Netherlands was great. It's probably one of the biggest games Chloe and Lisa have ever played in as the Dutch are the World's number one team.

Fatima Moreira de Melo, the Dutch number 4 midfielder, is a star in Holland having appeared on the cover of FHM Magazine in the country, and presents her own fashion make-over show on TV . She is also recording a record and has just finished studying law - wow! How does she find the time to play hockey?

Oliver relaxes in 'Beckham's seat'.

In the sport she is famous for her 360 degree turns in the defensive area and she tried one straight off around five minutes in. However, England cut her down to size very quickly and she didn't really figure that much.

The goal came from an amazing penalty corner. I was sitting in the stand at the correct end and had a very good view of the corner as it rattled around past the England defence like a pin ball machine and there were two dummy hits to top it off! The result is probably a fair reflection of the game.

Saturday 30th September

After the disappointment of not beating the Dutch came a rest day for the England Team. I visited the Real Madrid Stadium at Santiago Bernabeu and it is massive!

The tour consists of being taken in a lift up to the top tiers of seating, so you can see down onto the pitch from a great height. Then you get taken back down and can walk about the team dug-outs and the Presidential box. There are some lovely seats! The picture is of me sitting in the seat the supposedly David Beckham sits in when he's on the subs bench!

The impressive Bernabeu stadium

Going to a stadium like Santiago Bernabeu gives you quite a good comparison
on just how tiny the large stands are at the Club de Campo - where the Hockey World Cup is being staged.

After leaving Real Madrid around lunch I battled my way through lots of shady gentlemen trying to sell me tickets to different Real Madrid matches and got on the Metro to watch some of the afternoon hockey matches.

Australia beat Korea by 4 goals to 3 to almost win Pool B. Nikki Hudson, the Sydney 2000 Olympic Gold and Melbourne Commonwealth Games Gold Medallist, scored a goal against Korea so I decided to try and interview her. After hanging around the entrance to the locker room for what seemed like ages in the hot sun she appeared and was happy to be interviewed. She was very chatty and said she thought England could win the World Cup....surely she's rooting for the wrong team?

Then it was back to the commentary box where USA were taking on Japan in a very dull match. Shortly before the start of Argentina versus South Africa I was unexpectedly joined in the commentary box by the England Hockey Performance Director David Faulkner, himself a 1988 Olympic Gold Medal winner. His job as Performance Director is to find the next set of future Gold Medal Winning English Hockey Players, so that the Great Britain side that competes at the 2012 London Olympics stand as good a chance as possible.

Argentina were not as good as when they played England at Reading in August. The team is built around superstar Luciana Aymar, and she is excellent. She has speed and amazing ball skills, a complete game in herself. However, she seems to be surrounded by a growing number of younger players who are not as good as her. The consequence of this is that all the attacks come through her in the centre forward position and she is called upon to help out the wingers all the time.

Australia's Nikki Hudson

It makes defending against them much easier as you just need to shut her out and this was proven in the result. South Africa should have lost by rights, but Argentina failed to beat them, drawing 2 - 2.

Aymar is a superstar in her home country. She is the face of a certain international credit card and she advertises mobile phones. Talking to two fans after the match (in English as my Spanish isn't that good!) they said she is 'second only to Maradona in Argentina".

For the second half I went and sat with the Argentineans across the other side of the pitch. It was a great atmosphere, but as Argentina were trailing by a goal for most of the second half the fans were a little down.

So, a busy day of excitement then. Just time to slip down the bar!

Sunday 1st October

We should have beaten the Indian side, but when we play the Indians it's always controversial. In the 2002 Manchester Commonwealth Games England lost the Gold Medal in a confused golden goal final, meaning some players left the pitch without knowing who had won.

This match proved no different. The first half was unexceptional apart from an Indian goal that was disallowed for dangerous play; the Indian play produced a lovely cricket style 'pull shot' for Lakra to slam home. The umpires conferred and ruled no goal.

This lead to a heated half-time whereby views were exchanged with the umpires by the players off the pitch, particularly the Indian team and Coach who were late in coming out almost as a protest.

The second half got underway with England attempting to dominate. Thirteen minutes in and the fans from Essex got what they wanted a goal - a Chloe Rogers goal! The goalie stepped on the ball and Chloe jabbed quickly with her stick to force it over the line.

Crowd watching England take on India.

India fought back and had four penalty corners in a row. The first one was stopped on the line by an England player after it had beaten Katy Roberts in goal for her first match of the tournament. The penalty flick followed to make it 1-1.

Then with six minutes left Alex Danson cleared the Indian goalie and had an open goal which she missed. As she saw what happened the frustration showed. With two minutes left Crista Cullen fired a powerful shot straight at England forward Kerry Williams in the box and it clipped her stick and went in, the umpire blew her whistle and gave a goal.

I was sure I heard the clip of her stick, however after consultation with the other umpire it was ruled not to have been touched by Kerry Williams and therefore was disallowed because nobody in the box had touched it. The umpires watched the large TV Screen replays and took a full five minutes to come to a decision, but Kerry believes she connected with the ball.

So it ended England 1-1 India, a real pity. Germany won their game to take them level with Spain in second place in Pool A. So England are in 4th place and we have to beat the Germans on Tuesday.