India's World Cup misery continued, as they lost their opening match to Germany 4-1. The Germans scored all four goals in the first half. Sabu Varkey got India's only goal in the 54th minute.

India's second match was a bigger disaster as the Netherlands thumped them 5-0, with Stephan Veen scoring a hat-trick. After a day's rest, Dhanraj Pillay's team took on South Korea. And lost again, though narrowly at 3-4. Korea's match-winner came in the dying seconds.

Two days later, the team played New Zealand and won 1-0, Mukesh Kumar scoring the winner. But a 4-1 defeat against Canada saw them land up last in the six-team pool and forced to play off for the ninth to twelfth spots. Fortunately, they beat Poland 6-2 and New Zealand 1-0 and ended up ninth.

The tournament was also disastrous for defending champions Pakistan. They failed to make the semi-finals, but finished fifth in the tournament. They were the only Asian side to finish among the top six.

In the semi-finals, Holland rode on three penalty-corner goals by Bram Lomans to beat Australia 6-2 while Spain shocked Germany 3-0.

The final was a thriller that was decided by a 'golden goal'. The Dutch rallied from a 0-2 deficit to emerge triumphant. After the teams were locked 2-2 at the end of full-time, Teun de Noijer scored the match-winner for Holland from a penalty corner in the 83rd minute.

German Oliver Domke was voted 'Player of the Tournament'.

There were other awards: Best goalkeeper -- Ramon Jufresa (Spain), Top scorer -- Jay Stacy (Australia, 12 goals), Most supporting player -- Shahbaz Ahmed, Sr, (Pakistan); FIH Fairplay Trophy -- Germany.

Final Positions
1.	The Netherlands
2.	Spain
3.	Australia
4.	Germany
5.	Pakistan
6.	England
7.	Canada
8.	Korea
9.	India
10.	New Zealand
11.	Malaysia
12.	Poland

Indian Team:
Jude Menezes, Jagdish Ponnappa, Dilip Tirkey, Lazarus Barla, Anil Aldrin, Baljit Singh Saini, Mohammed Riaz, Ramandeep Singh, Thirumalavalavan, Mukesh Kumar, Sabu Varkey, Dhanraj Pillay (captain), Rajesh Chauhan, Sameer Dad, Rajeev Mishra, Harbhajan Singh. Stand-byes: Poonacha, Dinesh Nayak, Sukhbir Singh Gill, Kamal Horo, Virender Singh, Baljit Singh Chandi, Devinder Kumar, Senthil
Chief Coach: V Bhaskaran
Assistant Coaches: C R Kumar, Ramesh Parameswaran
Team Doctor: Dr S A Cruz
Trainer: G Gunasekharan