India beat Belgium 2-1 to lift Junior Hockey World Cup after 15 Years

India beat Belgium 2-1 in the final held at Major Dhyan Chand Hockey Stadium, Lucknow and created history by becoming the first host nation to lift Junior Hockey world cup since its inception. The victory was sweet as India regained world cup after a long wait of 15 years. With its First title coming way back in 2001 in Hobart.

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India thereby maintained its unbeaten record in the tournament. This was a thoroughly dominant performance from the Harjeet sing’s men. It was a Historic day for India as they reclaimed the title. India was flawless from the word go and the scored two field goals through the likes of Gurjant Singh (8th minute) and Simranjeet Singh (22nd) and dominated the proceedings for the major part of the game to emerge deserved winners.

Also, the role played by coach Harendra Singh and team India's senior coach Roelant Oltmans is worth mentioning. With the vociferous crowd cheering them India were dominant from the start and created a number of scoring opportunities. They created pressure on the  Belgian defense with continuous raids. India earned two penalty corners within the first six minutes that speaks volumes of their offensive game. However they wasted both their penalty opportunities.

It was in the eight-minute India drew the first blood through the strike of Gurjant. The goal was set up by scoop by Sumit from deep which ricocheted off the Goal keeper's chest and Gurjant immediately pounced on the opportunity with a reverse scoop past Goal keeper van Doren to hand India the second goal in the 22 nd minute of the game and India led Belgium by 2-0.

It took Belgium 20 minutes to enter the circle breaching Indias strong defense and in the 30th minute they earned the opportunity to score through penalty corner but failed to convert. Five minutes later  Gregory Stockbroekx has another but he deflected the ball of Goalkeeper Vikas Dahiya.

Belgium finally was able to break the shackles in the dying minutes of the game through Fabrice van Bockrijck's  penalty corner to make to 2-1. But it was soon followed by the final whistle and what that followed was an electric atmosphere in the stadium with fans going frenzy over the win and the players celebrated by dancing rhythmically to the songs and hugged each other. The trophy was presented by Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav.

Accolades started to pour in and Prime minister Shri Narendra Modi left a congratulatory message in twitter

Extremely proud of our youngsters! Congratulations to our junior hockey team for winning the #JuniorHockeyWorldCup.

— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) December 18, 2016

The #JuniorHockeyWorldCup win augurs well for the future of Indian hockey & will make the sport even more popular among youngsters.

— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) December 18, 2016

Union sports minister Vijay Goel announced a prize money of Rs 3 lakh to each Player on the win.

We're progressing in Hockey. Prize money of Rs 3 Lakh will b given to each player-Vijay Goel,Union Sports Min on Junior Hockey World Cup win pic.twitter.com/CQAYdXT3F9

— ANI (@ANI_news) December 18, 2016