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| Vitality Hockey World Cup 2018 |
After a day of well-deserved rest, hockey action was back on Day 3 with two games between Japan- New Zealand and Australia-Belgium. Fans who were hoping for a goal fest were disappointed as two games saw just 3 goals being scored as the game between Australia and Belgium ended in a 0-0 draw.
The day 3 started with ‘Cherry Blossoms’ Japan taking on ‘Black Sticks’ New Zealand with neutral hockey fans expecting New Zealand to easily beat Japan. But, they were in for a shock as Japan played with real intent and earned a 2-1 win over New Zealand.
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| Goal scoring pattern |
The game between Australia and Belgium was dominated by Australia but there were no goals to show for at the end of the game while Belgium enjoyed better possession among both the teams. Australia had 10 shots on target compared to Belgium’s 3 and Australia also won 6 penalty corners but could not score off any of those.
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| Top Goalscorers |
While match-day 4 of the World Cup saw Germany beating Argentina 3-2 with Charlotte Stapenhorst joining Argentina’s Maria Ortiz as the top goal scorer of the tournament with 3 goals while USA and England played a 1-1 draw. Alex Danson opened the scoring for hosts England in the 34th minute of the play but USA took just 5 minutes to equalize through Erin Matson.
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| Field goals rule |
Here are some numbers from Day 3 and 4 of Vitality Hockey World Cup
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| Dismal penalty corner conversion rate |
- Japan became the first Asian team to secure a win at the World Cup 2018 when they beat New Zealand 2-1.
- 49 goals have been scored in the World Cup in 12 matches with an average of 4.08 goals per game.
- Out of teams from 5 continents, only Africa is yet to register a victory with Japan getting the first win for Asia with the win over New Zealand.
- Field goals still rule the World Cup with 64% of the goals scored being field goals, while 29% of goals were scored through penalty corners.
- Maria Ortiz of Argentina and Charlotte Stapenshorst of Germany are top scorers of the tournament with 3 goals. All three goals were scored by both the players were field goals.
- Top position of the naughty list is currently held by 4 players- Brooke Peris of Australia, Xiaoming Song of China, Maria Garraffo of Italy and Olivia Merry of New Zealand.
- Penalty corner conversion ratio has steeply fallen down as only 13 of the total 76 penalty corners earned were converted with conversion ratio of just 17%.
Day 5 of the Vitality Hockey World Cup will see Spain taking on South Africa as both teams are looking to earn their first victory of the tournament. Second game of the day will see India facing Ireland.
