English wait for a Champions Trophy victory continues

2009 Men's Champions Trophy
Venue: Melbourne, Australia Dates: 28 November to 6 December
Coverage: Highlights and match reports on the BBC Sport website

Distraught England players after defeat by the Netherlands

Champions Trophy hockey - England lose to Netherlands

England's wait for a win at the Hockey Champions Trophy goes on after they lost 3-2 to the Netherlands.

Early goals by Robbert Kemperman and Rob Reckers put the Dutch on top before Richard Mantell pulled one back.

Kemperman's second made it 3-1 to the Dutch and although Richard Smith's goal closed the gap, England went down to their third defeat in four games.

They will now play Spain in Sunday's fifth place play-off after the Spanish were held to a 5-5 draw by South Korea.

"It was, yet again, a frustrating day," said assistant coach Bobby Crutchley afterwards.

"Our first-half performance was poor, definitely not up to our usual level, but in the second half we pulled ourselves back, we created chances and we could have got back into it.

"It's just a shame we didn't play the whole game like we played in the second half."