Hockey World Cup: Belgium Ride On Strong Defence Past New Zealand Into Semis

Bhubaneswar: Defencing Champions Belgium remained on course for back-to-back titles as they reached the semifinals of the FIH Odisha Hockey Men's World Cup 203, prevailing 2-0 over New Zealand in the quarterfinals at the Kalinga Stadium here on Tuesday.

They joined World No.1 Australia in the semifinals and await the winner of the Netherlands and Korea on Wednesday to decide a place in the final.

The Red Lions struck via Tom Boon in the 10th minute and Florent Van Aubel then doubled their lead in the 15th minute. The two strikes in the first two quarters proved enough as they defended stoutly to thwart New Zealand.

The talk before the game was the injury suffered by Alex Hendrickx leaving Belgium without their ace drag-flicker for the rest of the World Cup.

Earlier, goalkeeper Andrew Carter saved a penalty stroke by Marc Miralles with five minutes to the final hooter as Australia came back from a two-goal deficit to prevail over a fighting Spain in the first quarterfinal.

Australia were leading 4-3 with five minutes to go when Spain earned a penalty stroke for a stick-check foul inside the shooting circle. But the experienced Carter correctly guessed the direction of Miralles' push and palmed it away. If Spain had scored that goal, they would have taken the match into a shoot-out. Instead, Australia survived the remaining time and sealed their place in the semifinals where they await the winner of the fourth quarterfinal between England and Germany.

Jeremy Hayward (32nd min and 36th min) struck a brace of goals for Australia while Flynn Ogilvie (29th min) and Aran Zalewski (31st min) contributed one goal each to the Australian score. Xavier Gispert (19th min) and Marc Recasens had given Spain a 2-0 lead before the World No.1 fought back not only to level the scores but with Hayward blasting home two penalty corners within five minutes, Australia surged to a 4-2 lead.

Australia have reached the semifinals every time since 1975 but came close to losing that record as Spain gave them a huge scare, capitalising on counter-attacks and leaving the usually steady Kookaburras defense gasping as they scored two goals in the second quarter to lead 2-0.

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