Upton hoping to “bounce back” after disappointing World Cup group stage exit

The Limerick native was reflecting on a third successive loss at the World Cup.

Ireland exited the group stages of the Women’s Hockey World Cup after three disappointing group games saw them without a win.

The 3-0 defeat to Germany yesterday ensured Sean Dancer’s side would exit the competition early after reaching the final in 2018.

It was the loss to Chile in their second game that came as a surprise as Ireland needed a 3-0 victory against the Germans to move into the knockout stages.

But the European outfit proved too strong to finish second in the group behind the Netherlands who won each of their games.

It means Ireland will now play their next fixture on Sunday with the opponent to be confirmed on Saturday in Amsterdam and Upton says there is something still on the line.

“We’re bitterly disappointed, it’s not where we want we to be after three games. But what can I say, so proud of the girls, fought until the very end, pulled our goalie with fifteen to play.

“We have to bounce back, our tournament isn’t over. We’ll wait and see who we’re up against and regroup again.”

Despite reaching the final four years ago, Dancer knew that it would be difficult with just five of the team remaining from that momentous achievement as he said to Hockey Ireland

“We knew coming into the tournament, it is a new and young group. We are certainly going to have some ups and downs and have to progress. When we review the tournament, we will have to take a lot of lessons out of the game but last night wasn’t the time to do it.

“We did bounce back and got ourselves into a good space to compete today. Sometimes that is not always the case in a tournament when you haven’t won the game you should have won.

“We knew it was a game we had to win and anything else would push us out. That was the mindset; we were going hell for leather to get something out of it. I was proud of how we played today; we are making some real progress.”

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Jack Neville