SA men go down to Argentina

Johannesburg - The South Africa men’s hockey team lost 4-2 to Argentina at the Deodoro in Rio de Janeiro on Sunday.

Argentina opened the scoring after four minutes through Augustin Mazzilli. Six minutes later Rodrigo Villa showed stunning stickwork along the right-hand baseline to net his side’s second goal in the 10th minute, giving the South Americans a 2-0 lead at half-time.

The second half started with SA transferring the ball at pace and running intelligently off the ball, but SA then lost the ball and Argentina pounced, Guillermo Schickendantz crossing from the left and a full-length dive by Facundo Callioni deflecting the ball into the backboard 3-0 in the 40th minute.

SA hit back and Lloyd Norris-Jones found the target after good build-up play in the 42nd minute to make it 3-1.

On the 23-metre line, Jethro Eustice then intercepted and passed square left to Clint Panther who smashed into the net on the backhand to make it 3-2 in the 47th minute.

Argentina made it 4-2 in the 53rd minute thanks to a Pedro Ibarra goal.