India beat Germany in in Men’s Hockey bronze medal match today and ended the 41-year-long medal drought. After scoring 5 goals against 4 in the thrilling match, India again emerged as one of the top teams in the world as they were once.
The last time Indian Hockey team achieved a medal in Olympics was in 1980 in Moscow, winning gold. Ever since then, the team couldn’t even qualify for semifinals util Tokyo.
During the match, it seemed India was losing to Germany once they were at a score for 1 against 3. But later on, the team took out full spirit and thrashed 4 goals back-to-back to bag the bronze medal and the third place after decades of waiting.
While Simranjeet Singh scored double goals (17th, 34th minutes) for India, Hardik Singh (27th), Harmanpreet Singh (29th) and Rupinder Pal Singh (31st) accounted for one each. The timely savings of Indian goal keeper P.R Sreejesh also had a pivotal role in the victory.
So far in Tokyo, India has bagged 4 medals including one silver and three bronzes. Indian wrestler Ravi Kumar Dahiya has also assured a medal by entering to the Men’s Freestyle Wrestling final (57-60 Kg), beating Kazakhstan’s Nurislam Sanayevin the semi.