KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 15 (Bernama) -- The national men's hockey squad's hopes of collecting their first point in the opening match of the 2026 World Cup campaign was dashed after suffering a crushing 1-5 defeat to Germany in their Group B match in Belgium tonight.
The result further adds to the misery of the squad coached by Brendon Carolan, as they failed to exact revenge on the German team after also suffering a disappointing 1-10 defeat in their previous meeting two years ago.
In the match held at the Belfius Hockey Arena, the national squad only managed a single goal through Muhammad Azrai Aizad Abu Kamal, who converted a penalty corner in the 40th minute.
The German’s crushed the Speedy Tigers with five goals through Jakob Brilla in the fourth minute, Christopher Ruhr (5'), Justus Weigand (8', 45'), and Paul-Philipp Kaufmann (53').
Meanwhile, Carolan admitted to being disappointed with the performance displayed by his charges tonight, describing that the Speedy Tigers did not play at their true capability.
"I think we’re disappointed. I think we could have been better today. I think, obviously, it’s been a while since we’ve played a top-five team, and we were really slow in the first quarter, and to go 0-3 down is obviously very disappointing.
"Second quarter we got a little bit better, and our third quarter when we started matching up a bit more defensively, and that third quarter was a bit better. The build-up showed a bit of positives, at least we created circle opportunities and had a couple of corner opportunities," he said via a video shared by the Malaysian Hockey Confederation today.
The Speedy Tigers are scheduled to face France on Monday before completing their Group B matches against the host country on Thursday.
-- BERNAMA