Hockey: Towns inspires NZ to Olympic qualifying win

10.00am

An impassioned half-time speech by injured captain Simon Towns spurred the New Zealand men's hockey team to a crucial victory at an Olympic qualifying tournament in Madrid, Spain, today.

Towns read the riot act to his teammates in their changing room during the break when they trailed South Africa 1-2 in a match they had to win to earn a berth at the Olympic Games in Athens in August.

What he had to say was blunt and to the point. It also worked, as his team turned around the deficit to win 3-2 and confirm their presence at the Olympics for the first time since 1992 when Towns, now 31, just missed out by being named a non-travelling reserve.

Towns, discomforted by a leg injury which precluded him taking the field for the second half, told NZPA he asked his players to lay everything on the line in the second half.

With team management staying outside the changing room, Towns looked each of his players in the eye and demanded improvement.

"I've never done that with the group before but in the first half we just didn't do ourselves justice," Towns said.

"It was the most raised my voice has ever got. There was a lot of passion there. I knew I couldn't get back on the field and I'd been waiting 12 years to play at the Olympics. I really wanted to go.

"We were the better side but we were playing nervous hockey, we weren't executing basic skills and we weren't giving ourselves the best chance to win the match.

"I asked all of the players to look at themselves and to think about what they needed to do, what they are capable of doing. I asked them to put it out there on the field.

"It worked. They played superbly in the second half."

Towns' influence was clear immediately after the interval as drag flick specialist Hayden Shaw and Gareth Brooks both scored goals within the space of one minute to reclaim a lead the New Zealanders would not relinquish.

The result ensured they will finish no lower than sixth in the tournament, and it is the top seven nations in Madrid who advance to the Olympics.

They now face a playoff tomorrow to decide fifth and sixth places against Great Britain, who today beat Belgium 2-1.

New Zealand did not make the brightest of starts against South Africa as they conceded a goal in just the sixth minute but Shaw responded with the first of his two goals 10 minutes later.

South Africa retook the lead three minutes shy of halftime, leaving Towns in a grumpy mood at the break.

New Zealand assistant coach Charlie Oscroft told National Radio that management stayed out of the changing room to allow Towns to have his stay during the halftime break.

"We (management) just stepped out of the changing room, we didn't go in and we let him finish what he wanted to say," Oscroft said.

"In hindsight it was a wonderful thing because Simon was suffering with his leg and he didn't go back on the field in the second half.

"His comments paid dividends for us."

- NZPA