New Zealand makes Champions Trophy history

New Zealand media is buzzing with news of New Zealand’s historic 3-1 win over Netherlands in the men’s field hockey Champions Trophy here Tuesday.

Previously New Zealand had won only one Champions Trophy game, against Spain in 1978, in their four previous tournaments then losing 19 consecutive games until Tuesday’s win over Netherlands.

New Zealand last beat the Dutch 2-1 on the way to winning New Zealand’s only hockey gold medal at the Montreal Olympics, 34 years ago. Despite having a population of just 4.3 million people New Zealand produce quality sportsmen, with many team sports — rugby union, rugby league, cricket and even a soccer team in the recent FIFA World Cup — consistently competitive against countries with much larger populations.

New Zealand coach Shane McLeod acknowledges the difficulty of raising the profile of hockey in New Zealand against stiff competition from other sports.

“We have a couple of tough sports to beat, including the All Blacks obviously, however hockey is a nice family sport and young people like the game because they are not penalised for how big or small you are when they play so it attracts a lot of people and the media coverage we get following results like this adds to the value of the game in New Zealand,” McLeod said.

McLeod believes the experience of his players in Holland and New Zealand’s defence contributed to New Zealand’s win.

“We have a lot of players who play in Holland and they enjoy that sort of competition,” McLeod said after the win.

“I think it is an advantage for us to have so many players from New Zealand who play in the Dutch hockey league because the competition in Holland is excellent and it really helps our players and I also think our players help the Dutch competition be what it is,” McLeod said.

MOENCHENGLADBACH, Thursday (AFP)