Deepak Thakur and Baljit Singh Dhillon scored a brace each as the Indian hockey team blanked a combined United States senior/junior team 7-0 in the first of two friendly matches at Moorpark College, California, on Saturday.
The Indians, who are in the last phase of their Olympic Games' preparations in the United States, did not have to push hard in the match against their 24th ranked opponents.
"We could have scored a few more goals, but we did not push hard since it was a friendly match," coach Rajinder Singh said after the match.
After the second friendly on Sunday, the Indians play a pair of four-Nation tournaments in The Netherlands and German.
The team had been training at the Athletes' Performance Center in Tempe, Ariz. since early June.
The visitors made mincemeat of their opposition with four first half goals and added three more to the tally after the break. Five of them were field goals while the other two came through penalty-corners.
Thakur and Dhillon scored four of the five field goals while Gagan Ajit Singh's sounded the board off a rebound for the fifth one.
The two penalty-corners were converted by Kanwalpreet Singh and Dilip Tirkey.
"I am quite happy with the performance of the team. We tried various combinations and did plenty of rolling substitutions. And that worked well," Rajinder said.
Teams:
India: Kamaldeep Singh, Adrian D'Souza, Dilip Tirkey, Kanwalpreet Singh, Sandeep Singh, William Xalxo, Vikram Pillay, Viren Rasquinha, Bimal Lakra, Ignace Tirkey, Sunil Yadav, Gagan Ajit Singh, Baljeet Singh, Dhanraj Pillay, Prabhjot Singh, Deepak Thakur, Arjun Halappa, Inderjeet Singh.
Rajinder Singh (coach), Harendra Singh (assistant coach), M R Negi (goalkeeping coach), Oliver Kurtz (trainer).
USA: Shawn Nakamura, Shawn Hindy, Rinku Bhamber, Ian Scally, Patrick Harris, Jeb Saez, Chris Niles, Emaad Farooqui, Zafar Jadwet, Jonathan Ginolfi, Ryan Sherburne, Malachi Mahan, Danny Jordan, Ritchie Jordan, Zach Freundlich, Jacob Schlossler.
Shiv Jagday (coach), Shellie Onstead (assistant coach), Dave Harris (assistant coach), Kari Robertson (trainer), Dean Nakamura (manager).
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