Hockey: Bell heralds England victory

JOHN BELL scored his first international goal on his second appearance and set England on their way to a splendid 3-2 victory against Germany on the second day of the World Invitational here last night.

In a game full of incidents, including a 23-minute break when the lights failed, England attacked whole-heartedly, with Mark Pearn and Bell combining to create problems for the German defence.

In the end it was left to Jon Wyatt, with two well-worked goals at penalty corners, to seal victory. After Wyatt had put England ahead just before the interval the Germans, with goals from Bjorn Michel and Christoph Bechmann either side of the black-out, pulled back. With two minutes remaining Wyatt got the winner.

England's women battled well against a physical Dutch side before going down 2-1 to two penalty corner goals. England started well but, after failing to score from three early penalty corners, went behind in the 16th minute to Dillianne van den Boogaard's goal.

Within a couple of minutes England equalised through Anna Bennett. The Dutch stormed back, forcing two penalty corners. The second saw Suzan van der Wielen scoring at the far post.

England, with their teenagers Helen Richardson and Kate Walsh showing great potential, tried in vain to equalise against a Dutch defence marshalled by Julie Deiters. In the dying seconds England won another penalty corner but were unable to get a shot in.

Results, Digest, page 23