KARACHI, March 3: The Dutch Under-21 hockey coach Eric Verboom on Wednesday said victory against Pakistanis was surprising but rated his side as a better organized outfit.
"It is a pleasant and a surprising victory. We were not expecting a win against skillful Pakistanis who defeated us during Spanish tour last year. "Pakistanis are one fine and skillful lot. But I am surprised they missed a number of sitters in the second half which gave us a victory. I think our side was better organized," the coach said after his side won the match.
The Dutchman said since Pakistani youngsters had skill and the will they showed in Spain, he was expecting the same display which he said surprisingly the hosts failed to give.
Verboom is basically a Dutch women's national team assistant coach filling in Sonja Thomann's place who is expecting. The game against Pakistan was Verboom's first outing as Under-21 men's team coach.
The Dutch said the second game might not be a calkwalk as he had only 16 players at his disposal, while Pakistan had a pool of 25 youngsters. "At the moment, we have three players on the injury list. But the injuries are not serious and there may only be one player who could be on the injury list tomorrow," he said.
The Dutch said his side had some four-week training, three weeks practice with local clubs while three of four days with Under-21 side, before coming to Pakistan.
Verboom said hot weather was not to their liking but he overcame the odds by making the maximum use of the rolling substitution. "The weather was too hot and it was very hard to manage, especially near the end of the game as our players were exhausted. It was two or three degree Celsius in the Netherlands when we left.
We overcame the problem by making frequent substitutions during the game," he said. Pakistan team management blamed the presence of some "new" players in the line-up for the defeat. "We had Waqas Sharif, Mukhtar Ahmad, Imran Warsi, Nadeem Iqbal, Amir Shahzad, Naeem Akbar, who are new players. We fielded them to judge their potential.
"We will be working out to make a best possible combination for next month's Junior Asia Cup. That's why we lost," team manager Jahangir Butt and coach Asif Bajwa said.
Jahangir said although he did not think some two or three players deserved a place in the squad, he would be having discussions with the coach that would help the team managment give the squad a final shape.
