IPOH — New Zealand head coach, Greg Nicol, has made it clear that he will not change his team’s powerplay tactic despite conceding two goals in their last two matches at the ongoing Sultan Azlan Shah Cup.
The 49-year-old’s response came after his side’s shocking 6-4 defeat at the hands of Malaysia at the Azlan Shah Stadium today.
It was Malaysia’s second competitive win against New Zealand in a row since defeating them in the 2023 FIH Men’s World Cup in Bhubaneswar, India.
Greg said that powerplay has been the identity of his team over the years.
He also said that he ensures to change the variations of the tactic to avoid their opponents from easily scoring against them.
“I’m aware that our opponents have already known how to score against us when we use the powerplay, but I’m not going to change it just because we have conceded two goals in a row against Japan and Malaysia.
“We take risks by playing that tactic because we want to search for opportunities to score goals and make ourselves more offensive, hence I don’t find any harm in using the tactic.
“But I do agree that the tactic can give us trouble when we play against a high-paced team. It’s just that we need to improve and make ourselves better by trying to control our possessions and be more disciplined when we play that tactic.
“Other than that, the powerplay has never been a failure and has brought us a lot of benefits for our team over the years,” said Nicol when met during the post-match conference.
For context, the powerplay is used by a team to aggressively attack in an effort to score a goal when they are a few goals down in a match.
The tactic also focuses on effective defending to prevent the opposing team from scoring during this period.
Once the powerplay period ends or a goal is scored, both teams return to equal strength, and the game resumes normally.
New Zealand, known as the “Black Sticks” by their fans, have made 14 appearances in the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup and won the tournament twice (2012 and 2015) since its inception in 1983.
After the three matches in the round-robin stage of the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup, Pakistan tops the standings based on goal advantage though sharing seven points with Japan, followed by Malaysia (6 points), New Zealand (3 points), South Korea (3 points), and Canada, who have yet to secure a point.
The top two teams will challenge for the title, while the third and fourth-placed teams will play in the bronze medal play-off. — May 8, 2024