MANCHESTER - Hayden Shaw's sharp shooting helped the New Zealand men's hockey team to a decisive 5-2 win against South Africa in their final pool match of the Commonwealth Games in Manchester today.
The big Canterbury defender, who has taken over from veteran Brett Leaver as New Zealand's specialist penalty corner
striker, scored four goals that crushed the South African resistance. Three were from penalty corners and one a penalty stroke.
Shaw joined the New Zealand senior team earlier this year to play in the Six Nations Cup, having played for New Zealand Juniors' ranks. His four goals today were his top effort to date for New Zealand, having previously scored a hat-trick against Japan.
"He's going pretty well with his straight flicks and the goalkeeper really didn't have an answer," coach Kevin Towns said.
"He's coming on in leaps and bounds."
The result ensured New Zealand of second place in their pool behind Australia and set them up for a play-off against Canada, third placed in the other pool, for a semfinal spot. New Zealand thus avoid both the strong Pakistan and England teams in the semifinals and play tomorrow against a team they beat 5-2 and 4-0 in this year's World Cup qualifiers.
"We were pretty sharp today, although we had a few concerns at the back," Towns said.
"As South Africa always had to do better than a draw (to finish ahead of New Zealand in the pool) they were always going to put pressure on the guys at the back, so it made for a very interesting game."
New Zealand dominated the first spell, winning four penalty corners -- two of which they converted -- to lead 3-1 at halftime.
Shaw put New Zealand ahead with his first flick from the set piece in the third minute and repeated the dose in the 23rd minute. In between he also put away the penalty stroke.
South Africa made a couple of field goal attempts against the general run of play and pulled one goal back when Greg Nicol sent goalkeeper Paul Woolford the wrong way with a penalty corner shot in the 29th minute.
Soon after the break, New Zealand produced their best goal of the game. Skipper Simon Towns set Phil Burrows loose deep in the midfield and he dribbled the ball to the back line. When South African goalkeeper Chris Hibbert cut out his cross it went only as far as Towns who fired a brilliant reverse stick shot high into the goal.
It was all one way traffic as Parag and Archibald cut swathes through the South African defence and New Zealand took control of the midfield.
Shaw rattled the South African post with a 48th minute penalty corner and New Zealand were awarded another attempt straight after. This time Shaw made no mistake with his low shot into the backboard.
But South Africa never gave up and had a purple patch late in the game that yielded a field goal to Emile Smith when he latched on to a cross in the 53rd minute.
Men's Pool stages
Pool 3:
Australia 20 (Jamie Dwyer (3), Troy Elder (3), Aaron Hopkins, Brent Livermore, Michael Mccann (4), Matt Smith (2), Ben Taylor, Craig Victory (4), Scott Webster)
Barbados 1 (Roger Bailey).
HT: 9-0
Australia: Jamie Dwyer, Liam De Young, Michael Mccann, Craig Victory, Ben Taylor, Bevan George, Stephen Lambert, Scott Webster, Aaron Hopkins, Matthew Wells, Brent Livermore, Troy Elder, Paul Gaudoin, Matt Smith, Mark Hickman, Dean Butler
Barbados: Paul Inniss, Rodney Phillips, Jeffrey Webb, Tyrone Walkes, Mark Murray, Roger Bailey, Mark Owen, Stephen Franklyn, Kregg Franklin, Kwame Emmanuel, Rohan Thomas, Emmerson Phillips, Shawn Cumberbatch, Rodney Legall, Adrian Nichols, Kenneth Mcclean
Pool 3:
New Zealand 5 (Hayden Shaw (4), Simon Towns)
South Africa 2 (Greg Nicol, Emile Smith)
HT: 3-1
New Zealand: Simon Towns, Darren Smith, Wayne Mcindoe, Dion Gosling, Blair Hopping, Ryan Archibald, Umesh Parag, Bevan Hari, Paul Woolford, Phillip Burrows, Hayden Shaw, Mitesh Patel, David Kosoof, Dean Couzins, Michael Bevin, Peter Stafford
South Africa: Chris Hibbert, Bruce Jacobs, Gregg Clark, Emile Smith, Mike Cullen, Clyde Abrahams, Justin King, Greg Nicol, Kevin Chree, Wayne Denne, Steven Evans, Craig Jackson, Craig Fulton, David Staniforth, Denzil Dolley, Marvin Bam
Pool 4:
Pakistan 2 (Sohail Abbas, Muhammad Saqlain)
Canada 0
HT:1-0
Pakistan: Muhammad Qasim, Sohail Abbas, Muhammad Usman, Muhammad Saqlain, Waseem Ahmad, Muhammad Nadeem, Muhammad Sarwar, Muhammad Khalid, Zeeshan Ashraf, Mudassar Khan, Kamran Ashraf, Tariq Imran, Kashif Jawad, Muhammad Shabbir, Ahmed Alam, Ghazanfar Ali
Canada: Mike Mahood, Wayne Fernandes, Robin D'Abreo, Michael Lee, Ken Pereira, Bindi Kullar, Robert Short, Scott Sandison, Paul Wettlaufer, Ravi Kahlon, Rick Roberts, Mike Oliver, Steven Davis, Sean Campbell, Ranjeev Deol, Jon Mackinnon (Can) 1-0 1-0
Pool 4:
England 5 (David Mathews, Craig Parnham (2), Mark Pearn, Jon Wyatt)
Wales 0
HT: 2-0
England: Simon Mason, Jon Wyatt, Robert Todd, Billy Waugh, Craig Parnham, David Mathews, Mark Pearn, Brett Garrard, Jerome Goudie, Danny Hall, Michael Johnson, Jimi Lewis, Duncan Woods, James Wallis, Jon Peckett, Jason Collins
Wales: George Harris, Paul Edwards, Richard John, Rhys Joyce, Mathew Grace, Zach Jones, Mark Hoskin, James Westerman, James Davies-Yandle, Josh Smith, Simon Organ, Chris Ashcroft, Howard Hoskin, James Ogden, Owen Griffiths-Jones, Huw Jones
Pool champions Australia and Pakistan gain direct entry into the semi-finals, while England meet South Africa and Canada take on New Zealand in Wednesday's play-offs to determine the other semi-finalists.
- NZPA
Full coverage:
nzherald.co.nz/manchester2002
Medal table
Commonwealth Games info and related links
Hockey: Shaw scores four as NZ men finish pool on high
MANCHESTER - Hayden Shaw's sharp shooting helped the New Zealand men's hockey team to a decisive 5-2 win against South Africa in their final pool match of the Commonwealth Games in Manchester today.
The big Canterbury defender, who has taken over from veteran Brett Leaver as New Zealand's specialist penalty corner
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