Hockey: All smiles as Giles scores five
England Lions 7 United States
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Your support makes all the difference.CALUM GILES scored five times as an experimental England team, based mainly on the Under-21 squad and playing as the Lions, overran the United States' national squad at Lilleshall National Sports Centre yesterday in an entertaining if one-sided contest.
The pleasing aspect of Giles' performance for Barry Dancer, the England coach, will be his two goals from open play and his excellent work-rate.
The American defence had no answer to Giles' penalty-corner strike after he gave England the lead in the fourth minute at his first attempt while George Cover, Havant's 17-year-old making his debut at this level, scored with his first touch of the game when he came on as a substitute after 22 minutes, touching home Giles' cross from the right.
Giles claimed his second two minutes before the interval at England's second penalty corner, and Cover set up Giles with a precision pass for his third.
Two further goals by Giles early in the second half followed a short period of American pressure in which Nick Taylor, the England goalkeeper now playing with Harvestehuder in Hamburg, showed his ability with several good saves.
The game ended with the hard-working Cover, who had an impressive game, unselfishly providing the pass for Stuart Humphries to score England's seventh. Cover also brought good saves from the American goalkeeper at corners when Giles was resting.
ENGLAND: N Taylor (Harvestehuder); A Humphrey (Cannock), T Bertram (Bournville), B Barnes (Reading), C Parnham (Cannock); H Hoskin (Reading), Kalbir Takher (Cannock, capt), A Todd (Reading); S Humphries (Canterbury), A Simons (Southgate), C Giles (Southgate). Substitutes used: D Haydon (Teddington), G Cover (Havant), R Todd (Reading), Manpreet Kochar (Reading).
UNITED STATES: A Duncan; S Nakamura; B Schledorn, S Danielson, R Langford; S Jennings, L Amar, J Cook; D Eichner, Jang Badhesha, S Williams. Substitutes used: K Lewis, S Hindy, R Bhanmer, M Schanefelt and D Nakamura.
Umpires: C Hough (England) and Amrit Kohli (US).
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