England undermined by Dutch double

Hockey

Netherlands 2 Great Britain 1

Great Britain are still looking for their first victory as Germany, Pakistan and the Netherlands resumed battle here yesterday, but it was not an encouraging performance against a Dutch side who, after scoring two goals in the opening 16 minutes, lost direction and fell into the British style of slapdash passes.

After Simon Mason saved well from the first Dutch penalty corner in the second minute, he made another save from Taco van den Honert in the eighth minute but could do nothing to stop Teun de Nooyer's follow-up from close range. Another good save from Mason and a goal-line clearance from Soma Singh kept Britain in the game until the 16th minute when a carelessly taken free hit from Jon Wyatt was punished by Stephan Veen.

The Dutch seemed happy to sit back, and Jason Laslett pulled a goal back for Britain in the 61st minute. The game ended with three British penalty corners - two were not stopped and the third was a tame shot cleared off the line.

NETHERLANDS: R Jansen; E Jazet; W Van Pelt, J Delmee, L Klein Gebbink; J Brinkman, M Delissen (capt), F Jan Bovelander; T van den Honert, S Veen, T de Nooyer. Substitutes used: D Bree, T van Meer and R van der Wal.

GREAT BRITAIN: S Mason (Reading); P McGuire (Teddington), J Halls (Old Loughtonians), J Wyatt ( Reading), Soma Singh (Southgate); R Garcia (Polo Barcelona), Kalbir Takher (Canock), J Laslett (capt) (Teddington); C Mayer (Cannock), R Thompson (Hounslow), N Thompson (Old Loughtonians). Substitutes used: C Giles (Havant), J Shaw (Southgate); D Hall (Guildford).

Umpires: K Faizi (Pak) and C Siebrecht (Ger).