Bangladesh national hockey team received a wake-up call just one week ahead of the Hockey World League (Round-2) as they were beaten 2-0 by Ghana in the first of a three-match warm-up series yesterday.
The league is scheduled to be held from March 4 to 12 in Dhaka, with Bangladesh in Pool A alongside Malaysia, Fiji and Oman.
Bangladesh conceded a goal in the very first minute of the match when Ghana, who are six positions below Bangladesh in world rankings, saw forward Baah Shadrack find the back the net with a brilliant hit from an acute angle. Shadrack later scored in the third quarter to seal the victory for the visitors, who arrived here on Thursday night.
Even though Bangladesh dominated ball possession they struggled in receiving and passing and also in man-to-man marking.
Bangladesh head coach Oliver Kurtz was clearly unhappy with the lacklustre performance of the side, however, the German claimed that it was due to lack of match experience.
“Everybody can see why I was asking for an international camp,” Kurtz told reporters after the defeat. “Today everybody could see our boys were confused. Now we have only three warm-up matches but we need at least 8 to 10 matches to make our players flexible with different tactics.”
Bangladesh had won five penalty corners, but the two penalty corner specialists — Mamunur Rahman Chayan and Ashraful Islam — failed to convert any of those chances.
“Missing penalty corners is not a problem right now for me because we need match experience for that,” Kurtz said. “Only practising is not enough and they are also tired in the body from the preparation.”
The German head coach, who wanted to see the side go for a camp in his native South Africa but eventually failed in that attempt, expressed his displeasure with the way the players performed.
“I am not so much happy with man-to-man marking. There were many easy mistakes in receiving and passing. This is not because they are bad, they are good and fit, but they were nervous.”
Kurtz hoped that his team can bounce back from this defeat and play better in the next two matches, with the second warm-up match scheduled for tomorrow.
The German also said that the target for the team in the Hockey World League would be to finish second, behind Malaysia.
