Simpson's splendid enterprise

Hockey

BILL COLWILL

reports from Cape Town

Great Britain 1 China 0

Great Britain's women took a major step in their Olympic qualifying campaign here yesterday, thanks to a splendid goal from Scotland's Rhona Simpson in the 56th minute.

In a disappointing first half Britain found it difficult to get into their stride and only a superb defensive performance from Karen Brown ensured a blank half-time scoreline.

After the interval Britain moved forward with more conviction but it was not until midway through the half that the decisive goal came. A quickly taken free hit from Chris Cook found Simpson, who bore down on the Chinese circle and, after riding a crunching tackle, crashed the ball into the net.

GREAT BRITAIN: J Thompson (Ipswich); S Fraser (Grove), J Atkins (capt, Bradford Swithenbank), K Brown (Slough), L Cope (Balsam Leicester); M Davies (Sutton Canada Life), P Robertson (Grove), T Miller (Clifton); J Sixsmith (Sutton Canada Life), S MacDonald (Glasgow Western ), A Bennett (Slough). Substitutes used: R Simpson (Edinburgh), M Nicholls (Slough), C Cook (Hightown).

CHINA: Hong Ping Ding; Hong Chen; Yan Hong Wang, Jing Chen, Dong Hong Cai; Limei Qin, Hau Tang, Jianpin Chen; Ying Lin, Huiping Yang, Hong Bing Yang. Substitutes used: Hongmei Ao, Junkia Huang.

Results, Sporting Digest,

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