\n
After a tough finish at the World Cup, Indian hockey captain Harmanpreet Singh shared that the team’s focus will now turn to the upcoming Asian Games, where they aim to clinch the gold medal. India ended their World Cup journey in 8th place, experiencing a heart-wrenching loss to Belgium in the playoff for 7th and 8th positions. Throughout the tournament, India struggled against stronger teams and did not manage to secure a win.<\/p>\n
Looking ahead to the Asian Games next month, the team hopes to defend their title. Last year, India won the Asia Cup convincingly, and a gold medal at the Games in Japan would secure their spot in the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.<\/p>\n
In a statement after the loss, Harmanpreet noted that neither India nor Belgium wanted to compete for the lower ranks but emphasized the positives gained from facing top teams. \u201cBoth teams were in a similar mindset, not wanting to play this match. However, performing well against the world\u2019s best in front of their supporters is a big confidence boost,\u201d he mentioned.<\/p>\n
The Indian captain expressed satisfaction with his team\u2019s performance against Belgium, despite the disappointing final ranking. He said, \u201cWe discussed the importance of playing well for the full 60 minutes, and I believe we did that today. While we are pleased with how we played against Belgium, we are not happy with finishing eighth. But this is part of our journey, and we are now looking forward to the Asian Games, where we aim for gold and Olympic qualification.\u201d<\/p>\n
Harmanpreet also addressed concerns about the team’s defense, as they conceded 19 goals throughout the tournament, making it a weak point for them. He stressed the need for improvement, saying, \u201cThere are no individual accolades; it\u2019s always about the team. We share the responsibility for wins and losses. We have learned valuable lessons in defense, and if we don\u2019t strengthen this area, we will face challenges from strong teams. We must become tougher defensively.\u201d<\/p>\n
India will kick off their Asian Games campaign with a match against Indonesia on September 20.
\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
After a tough finish at the World Cup, Indian hockey captain Harmanpreet Singh shared that the team’s focus will now turn to the upcoming Asian Games, where they aim to clinch the gold medal. India ended their World Cup journey in 8th place, experiencing a heart-wrenching loss to Belgium in the playoff for 7th and<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":41786,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rank_math_lock_modified_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[29729,3349,54329,54885,54949,54950],"class_list":["post-41785","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-asian-games-2026","tag-harmanpreet-singh","tag-hockey-world-cup-2026","tag-india-vs-belgium-hockey","tag-indian-mens-hockey-team","tag-la-olympics-2028"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/indiabulletinusa.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41785","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/indiabulletinusa.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/indiabulletinusa.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indiabulletinusa.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indiabulletinusa.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41785"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/indiabulletinusa.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41785\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indiabulletinusa.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/indiabulletinusa.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41785"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indiabulletinusa.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41785"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indiabulletinusa.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41785"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}