Men’s EuroHockey Championship II (Lousada, Portugal) – day four round-up
Scotland were pushed all the way by Switzerland but eventually got the result they needed to pin down a semi-final spot alongside Wales, Ireland and Italy, the latter holding off Czechia.
It means all four remain in contention for the three World Cup qualifier tickets on offer and are one win from getting a spot at the 2027 EuroHockey Championships in London.
Pool A
Czechia 1 Italy 3
Italy took second place in Pool A with a 3-1 win over Czechia, built around a strong first quarter showing in which they built a 2-0 lead.
Davide Guiliani tipped in the first from an improvised penalty corner move and they extended the advantage with mere seconds left in Q1 from a more orthodox set-piece from Manuel Mondo.
Czechia got one back in Q2 when Štěpán Šmíd’s ball across took a heavy defensive touch at the near post, raising hopes they could turn things around get the win they needed. But those hopes ended when Italy intercepted 70-metres from goal, leading to Claudio Brocco slamming in a reverse-stick shot into an unguarded net.
Ireland 9 Portugal 0
Eight different scorers were on the mark as Ireland eased to first place in the group with their most fluid performance of the week to date. Mark McNellis set the tone, firing in a corner rebound and they never looked back.
Fergus Gibson, Ben Nelson and Louis Rowe all scored in the 25th minute for a 4-0 half-time lead and, from there, it was one-way traffic.
Pool B
Wales 14 Croatia 0
Wales put in an incredible first half performance to make extra sure of their semi-final spot in first place as they scored 12 times before half-time en route to a 14 goal win. Jack Pritchard top scored with four goals while Gareth Furlong got a hat trick; there were two goals each for Fred Newbold, Gareth Griffiths and Nic Morgan.
Switzerland 3 Scotland 4
Scotland got the result they needed to stay clear of Switzerland and move on to the semi-finals in second spot with Jamie Golden’s goal splitting a seven-goal cracker.
Jamie Green swept home in sixth minute to start the scoring from a swift right-wing move but Yannick Hug had levelled within a minute with a sweetly controlled volley.
Green, using the right channel once more, however made it 2-1 with still less than eight minutes played with a nice individual goal. And there was still time in Q1 for Golden to get this first of the day from a corner and Elias Brönnimann to touch in for 3-2.
Hug equalised midway through Q2 but they still needed a few more to get a win and build their goal difference to overtake the Scots. It was not to be as Scotland got the winner in the second half.
| Rank | Team | Pl | W | D | L | GF | GA | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wales | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 19 | 3 | 7 |
| 2 | Scotland | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 14 | 8 | 7 |
| 3 | Switzerland | 3 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 7 | 10 | 1 |
| 4 | Croatia | 3 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 6 | 25 | 1 |
Friday schedule
