Women’s Asia Cup hockey: India’s 1-4 reversal against China wasn’t a bad performance, but one that had avoidable mistakes

But as a team harbouring ambitions of winning the Asia Cup, the Indian women’s hockey team did not quite lay down the marker, as they went down 1-4 in Hangzhou on Thursday. India now have to avoid defeat, at the very least, against Japan on Saturday or better yet, win outright, to earn a rematch against China on Sunday.

Minutes before Mumtaz’s goal, however, India shot themselves in the foot. In the first minute of the second half, with the scoreline still 0-1 and India finishing the first half as the side on attacking ascendancy, playing flowing hockey, coach Harendra Singh wouldn’t have wanted to change much. But when Vaishnavi Vitthal Phalke – who has otherwise had a solid tournament – made the cardinal error of playing a square pass out of defence instead of going away from the danger area with the Chinese press well and truly on. The ball fell kindly to Chen, who squeezed it past Bichu Devi from a gifted 1-vs-1 situation. Vaishnavi had gotten herself into a similar situation in the first half but recovered quickly to put in a brilliant last-ditch tackle to prevent what seemed a certain goal. Even India’s first goal, coming in the fourth minute, was an avoidable error as Jyothi couldn’t clear the ball cleanly, allowing the tournament’s leading goalscorer Zou Meirong to have an easy tap-in.

Fought with heart, played with spirit. 💙

We take the lessons and will come back stronger. 💪#HockeyIndia #IndiaKaGame #WomensAsiaCup2025 pic.twitter.com/YUDqjbbikq

— Hockey India (@TheHockeyIndia) September 11, 2025

India’s naivete

Vaishnavi was involved in the goal that India eventually scored. Her attempted aerial out of defence was poorly struck but she won the ball back immediately with a solid tackle and released Lalremsiami through the middle. She, in turn, played a quick give-and-go with Neha and burst forward down the right before playing a crossfield pass to Mumtaz. The forward from Lucknow had made a clever backpedalling run to make space away from her Chinese markers, dribbled further inward into the circle and struck a powerful backhand as the ball flew past Wu Surong. It should have been the goal that revived India’s hopes of getting something out of the match if they continued to hold their defensive structure.

Instead, where India’s all-out attacking plan paid off in the end against Korea on Wednesday, it came back to bite them against the more vaunted opponents. Down to 10 after Udita’s green card, India continued to look for the equaliser (nearly found it too but the whistle went for a foot from Sunelita Toppo just when she thought she had scored). But China regrouped, came forward, won a Penalty Corner and scored off a deflection to deflate India’s spirits. And the last goal came from a counterattack as India left spaces open in their defence down the left.

Given the unfortunate late injury for Deepika and the retirement of Vandana Katariya, India were already without their main goalscoring threats in recent times. But even when the forward-cum-dragflicker was in the team, chance conversion was a puzzle that both former coach Janneke Schopman and now Harendra Singh have not been able to solve. If that were the case, the intensity with India played in the second quarter would have seen China pegged back. But instead, the hosts were able to absorb those moments of pressure and when they broke forward, were more clinical.

Before the tournament, coach Harendra told this daily that he didn’t want his players to think too much about China’s rising stature in women’s hockey and create pressure on themselves subconsciously. And for three-fourths of the Super 4s match against the red-hot favourites, India played that way too. Not giving too much respect to their opponents, trusting their own attacking skills, and going toe-to-toe at both ends of the pitch. That’s, broadly, India’s biggest takeaway from the performance… but in the end, the scoreboard read 4-1 in favour of China. It might be harsh given how evenly fought the match was, but it was a fair reflection of China’s overall quality and India’s naivete.