Hockey Olympic Qualifier: Mighty Germans storm into the final

Two-time world champions Germany qualified for the final of the Olympic hockey qualifiers in Kakamigahara, Japan, with a match to spare yesterday.

The Germans remained unbeaten after four matches after whipping Japan 4-0 yesterday.

They will go into the final on Sunday as the favourites to make the cut for the Beijing Olympics.

Their opponents in the final will be either Malaysia or Japan. The two teams will play in the final round-robin match tomorrow, with the winners meeting the Germans.

A draw yesterday would have still put the Germans in the final and, at the same time, virtually sealed Japan’s spot in the final as well.

But the well-oiled Germans were not about to take their foot off the gas, going about their task with minimum fuss to make sure they are the only team yet to concede a goal in the tournament, thus far.

The Germans were under siege in the early stages and only managed to score their first goal in the 21st minute through Philip Keller’s penalty corner attempt.

From then on it was all one-way traffic although Germany failed to increase their lead in the first-half.

Moritz Fuerste finally made it 2-0 for Germany in the 49th minute with a hefty hit from the top D.

Christopher Keller then added two goals in the 62nd and 65th minutes from penalty corner set pieces for a convincing win.

The two strikes took Christopher’s goal tally to six in the tournament.

In another match, Poland produced their best display to thrash Italy 6-0. It was the second win for the Poles, who will wrap up their fixtures with a match against Germany tomorrow.

Poland dominated the first-half, taking the lead in the 16th minute through Tomas Choczaj. An unmarked Tomasz Gorny made it 2-0 in the 26th minute before Martin Strykowski made it 3-0 in the 34th minute.

The Poles came back after the breather to knock in three more goals through Thomas Marcinkowski (41st minute), Marcin Grotowski (63rd) and Strykowski (67th).