Not really convincing, but never in trouble against New Zealand: the Red Lions trotting towards the last four | sport

What had been in the air for a while was confirmed this afternoon: after having to give up on a knee injury during the last pool match against Japan, Alexander Hendrickx’s World Cup is definitely over. Internally, this decision seemed to have been made in the last few days, but the Belgian staff didn’t want to give too much information to the opponent. To highlight the importance of penalty corner specialist Hendrickx to the Red Lions: three times our men of hockey have won gold in a major tournament and each time Hendrickx has become the leading scorer.

At the 2021 Olympics he dominated with fourteen goals, at the 2018 World Cup (seven goals) and the 2019 European Championship (five goals) he was co-top scorer. 23-year-old reserve Maxime Van Oost replaced Hendrickx in the squad. Van Oost – his father Michel was goalkeeper for the Belgian national team between 1979 and 1996 – is a youngster who has long wanted to make things difficult for our golden generation. Until this World Cup, he had only fourteen selections. “It’s already a dream for me to travel to India as a reserve,” he said before the start of the world championship.

As expected, the Red Lions started their quarter-final best against the Black Sticks. Already from the first minute, captain Félix Denayer failed to push. Without really creating very big chances, the New Zealanders got up sporadically, but it was Tom Boon who got the best opportunities. In the eleventh minute, the Belgians obtained a first penalty corner and it was immediately touched. John-John Dohmen, who turned 35 today, said Arthur Van Doren stopped and Tom Boon fired (1-0). Being precise on a corner without Alexander Hendrickx: it is possible. A second Belgian goal almost followed in the last second of the first quarter, but Simon Gougnard saw his shot stopped.

From the second minute of the second quarter, the game was almost over: via Nicolas de Kerpel and Simon Gougnard, the ball entered the circle to Florent Van Aubel and the teammate of Alexander Hendrickx and Sébastien Dockier at Amstelveen Pinoké struck mercilessly.( 2-0). A few minutes later, Van Aubel was close to his second goal after a brilliant attack, but the ball went past New Zealand goalkeeper Dixon. In the second quarter, a second penalty corner followed for the fiercely dominant Lions: Dixon deflected Loïck Luypaert’s shot and Dohmen simply couldn’t finish in the rebound. Just before the break, the Kiwis got their first PC: Vincent Vanasch made a nice save. Half time: 2-0

In the third quarter, the Lions continued to quietly dominate, but the pace was too slow to do the job completely. There was a third Belgian penalty and Nicolas de Kerpel and Cédric Charlier also had chances. On the other side, New Zealand was too immature.

The New Zealanders had to get into place in the last quarter of an hour and the Red Lions got away with it with a second PC for the opponent. The successful variant on PC is simply not entered. The less convincing Lions gave New Zealand another chance to get back into the game, but luckily they lacked effectiveness. With seven minutes left on the clock, the New Zealand goalkeeper went to the side and the Black Sticks tried with eleven outfield players. It did nothing more. The Lions won 2-0 but need to step up to the semi-finals.

After this logical victory, the Red Lions will fight for the medals in Bhubaneswar until Sunday anyway. On Friday at 2:30 p.m., they will play half-time hockey against the winner of the quarter-final between the Netherlands and surprising South Korea, who eliminated Argentina in the crossover. A duel against the Netherlands would mean a replay of the 2018 World Cup final in India. Earlier in the day, world number one Australia narrowly beat Spain 4-3. The Kookaburras play in the semi-final against the winner of the match between England and Germany.

The Red Lions started with: Vincent Vanasch, Loïck Luypaert, Gauthier Boccard, Arthur Van Doren, Arthur De Sloover, Felix Denayer, Antoine Kina, Victor Wegnez, Florent Van Aubel, Tanguy Cosyns and Tom Boon. Then follow: John-John Dohmen, Maxime Van Oost, Simon Gougnard, Nicolas de Kerpel and Cédric Charlier.