We take a look at some of the players likely to be the ‘key players’ at the Hockey World League Semi-Finals.
The heat will certainly be on for the teams competing in Buenos Aires. Argentina will go into the competition with the weight of expectation on their shoulders as the passionate home crowds will be hoping Los Leones can emulate the success of the women. 2015 FIH Rising Star of the Year, Gonzalo Peillat will find himself very much centre stage. This was the player of whom team mate Lucas Vila said during the 2014 Hockey World Cup, “We try to get a penalty corner, because we know Gonzalo will convert it.” That level of expectation is enough to make the shoulders of most men sag, but Peillat proves time and again that he is more than capable of handling the pressure as his goal tally in the blue and white strip continues to mount.
China will arrive in Valencia knowing that they have to perform well. They lost out on Olympic qualification through the Asian Games when they were defeated by Korea in the final, so this is their second bite at the cherry. In the team for Valencia is a player who has rediscovered her scoring touch, most recently in the Hawkes Bay tournament in New Zealand - Mengyu Wang. The 23-year-old has a fearsome penalty corner strike and can pounce on rebounds and loose balls with a predatory sharpness.
Another team that consistently threatens to win, but has yet to finish on a podium in a major competition, is New Zealand women. Ranked fourth in the world, regularly appearing in the quarter and semi-final stages of competitions, the feisty, speedy and skilful Black Sticks team has yet to deliver the results that Mark Hager and his players so desperately want. At the 2014 World Cup, they finished fifth and six months later at the Champions Trophy they finished fourth. The epitome of the Black sticks team is their captain and penalty corner striker Anita Punt. With more than 70 international goals to her name and approaching her 200th cap, the mid-fielder is able to turn games around with her speed, vision and thunderous drag flick.
The final player in this selection of key players is the Great Britain captain, Barry Middleton. With 229 caps for England and a further 110 caps for Great Britain, the midfielder is a huge influence on his team, whose tricky runs up the pitch and willingness to play his part defensively, make him an integral part of the England and GB set-up. In Antwerp, Middleton and his team will need to turn good form in warm-up games into meaningful results on the pitch. The team has dropped one place in the world rankings, but will be confident that they go to Belgium as one of the stronger teams in the group. The GB squad is another team that has been through a period of transition, but is now showing a strength and depth that will make them real contenders in the HWL Semi-Finals.
