Germany blitzes Argentina 6-2

Trailing 0-2 at half-time, Germany stormed back to score six goals in the next 35 minutes, and blasted Argentina 6-2 in a men's classification match in the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games at the State Hockey Centre on Thursday morning.

Jorge Lombi, whose individual brilliance has sparked Argentina's fine run in the tournament thus far, converted a penalty in the 13th minute and one minute later, struck again with a brilliant diving deflection that had to be marked down as one of the best goals of the tournament.

Germany got a second wind and outplayed Argentina for the remainder of the second half, but were perenially frustrated by the tough Argentine defence.

The Germans, though, came out storming in the second half, scoring three times inside the first ten minutes. Oliver Domke began the rush in the third minute with a fine field goal capping a superlative burst of short-passes, followed by another one from Bjoern Emmerling in the 4th minute with a drive that went between the legs of the startled goalkeeper. A penalty corner saw Christoff Bechmann increase the tally to three, and from there on Argentina was struggling.

Bjoern Michel shut Argentina out of the game with two penalty-corner conversions in the final three minutes of the match, after Bechmann had added his second goal again off a penalty.

Over all, the game was scrappy, and one-sided. German dominance was evident in the 28 tries on goal they notched up, as against just four by the Argentines. The scrappy play was made worse by much ill-temper on both sides.

Germany now play Great Britain in the playoff for 5th place, and will get a chance to avenge a shock 2-1 defeat in the league round on Tuesday that cost the Germans a place in the semifinals.

Argentina, who finished ninth in Atlanta, can improve two places on that effort by beating India in the play-off for seventh place, which will be held on Friday.

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