Bhaskaran blames it on brittle defence

Monchengladbach, Sep 13 (UNI) After yet another drubbing, this time at Dutch hands, in the hockey World Cup, coach Vasudevan Bhaskaran said a brittle defence did India in during yesterday's 6-1 pounding.

Clueless to explain why the defence crumbled so many times against the Dutch, Bhaskaran didn't hesitate to blame it squarely on a porous and rickety defence.

''We conceded far too many penalty corners in the match and they scored six goals from them. The defence is definitely weak and we were soft in conceding one after another penalty corners,'' he rued.

''They managed 10 penalty corners, while we got just three. And they converted six out of 10 and that made all the difference,'' he added.

Asked if India would bring in new faces to bolster the defence, Bhaskaran evaded a direct answer and said, ''Of course we need to strengthen the defence.'' The coach, however, insisted that India didn't play too badly in the tournament but felt lady luck turned her back on the side.

''We played well and in fact could have won a couple of matches in the tuornament. I mean we saw so many upsets here and our side was capable of pulling off one or two as well. But we simply didn't have the luck.

''But I think five-six youngsters proved their worth here.

Players like Tushar (Khandekar), Shivendra (Singh) and (VS) Vinay can be the nucleus of future teams and they really impressed here,'' he said.

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