Paris Olympics 2024: Emotional Harmanpreet Singh expresses heartbreak after semi-final loss, says 'Our target was gold, our dream was broken'

Harmanpreet Singh in frame (Twitter)
Harmanpreet Singh in frame (Twitter)

Highlights:

Indian hockey team suffered a 2-3 loss against Germany in the semi-finals.

They will now be facing Spain in the Bronze medal match.

The Indian hockey team has had to face a heartbreaking defeat against Germany. India lost the match against Germany 2-3. After this defeat, Team India has now missed the chance to win gold and silver medals and now they will have to play the match for the bronze medal. India has to play its bronze medal match against Spain on 7th August. India made many mistakes in the match and also missed many opportunities. Captain Harmanpreet Singh gave a very strong start to India. In the 7th minute, the team got a penalty corner and the team converted it into a goal. But the German players did not go on the back foot and in the 11th minute, they won by converting a short corner into a goal. After this, in the 27th minute, Germany appealed to the referee and took a penalty stroke. In such a situation, Christopher Roor did not make any mistakes and gave the team a lead of 2-1.

 

However, only 6 minutes had passed in the second half and then Sukhjit Singh from India's side fired Harmanpreet's drag flick into the net. But 6 minutes before the final hooter, Marco Mitkau converted the shot towards the goalpost into the net and thus Germany got the third goal. The Indian team made many mistakes, the result of which was their defeat in the end. Harmanpreet was extremely emotional after the loss and said their dream was broken.

 

Harmanpreet Kair after the loss

 

“It is sad for us. We tried our best. We put in everything, last time also we went from here only. We don't want to go empty handed. But our luck did not favor us. If we look at it defensively, we lost the match. Germany showed an amazing game. Whatever opportunities we got, we wasted them.  We have come here to win medals. Our target was gold. Our dream was broken. It is better to win bronze than to win nothing. We will continue to work hard. Vinesh has a big opportunity. She is playing gold medal. They have nothing to lose. He will have to win gold medal for the country,” said Harmanpreet Singh after the loss against Germany.

 

India to face Spain now

 

However, despite this heartbreaking loss, India's medal hopes are still alive. They won't be able to get Gold or Silver medals but they will now be going one-on-one loss against Spain in the Bronze medal match. They won the Bronze in the Tokyo edition as well and would like to get another one here.

 

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