Holland, Spain qualify for Athens Olympics

Hosts Spain and The Netherlands expectedly qualified for the 2004 Athens Olympics men's hockey tournament when they defeated Britain 2-1 and Poland 4-0 respectively in Pool A league matches of the qualifying tournament in Madrid on Sunday.

Playing at half pace, the Dutch turned back Poland as Floris Evers (11th), Erik Jazet (26th minute) and Teun de Nooijer (67th and 69th) scored, handing the Olympic champions, who had drawn 2-2 with Spain, their third win in four matches.

Earlier, Spain got past Britain.

Xavier Ribas converted two penalty-corners (41st, 55th minutes) for Spain in reply to a 13th minute strike by Danny Hall.

The result put Spain on 10 points, the same as the Dutch as the two confirmed their progress to the semi-finals of this 12-nation tournament.

Meanwhile, South Africa pulled off a 2-1 victory over Japan to move to third spot in the pool, behind Holland and Spain, with six points.

Poland occupy fourth spot with four points, followed by Britain with three and Japan one.

South Africa recovered from a 0-1deficit to record their second success in four matches in pool A.

Japan began on an aggressive note, scoring a penalty-corner goal through Takahiko Yamabori in the 14th minute. But South Africa yet again found their hero in Greg Nicol, who scored twice in the 43rd and 65th minutes for a hard-earned victory that took their points tally to six.

Incidentally, Nicol joined Pakistan's Sohail Abbas at the top of the goal-scorers' list with a haul of six.