Whitaker incensed by careless England

Hockey

BILL COLWILL

reports from Dublin

The England coach, David Whitaker, was furious after England's 4-4 draw with Switzerland in their last pool game in the European Championship here yesterday.

The coach said: "We are all bitterly disappointed with today's result. We have thrown away a wonderful opportunity to head the pool and avoid the Netherlands in the semi-finals."

England three times came from behind to level the score and were only saved from humiliation by the slick penalty corner precision of the specialist Calum Giles who, in a total of just under four minutes on the field for the set-pieces, scored three goals and provided Russell Garcia with England's fourth.

ENGLAND: D Luckes (East Grinstead); J Halls (Old Loughtonians), P McGuire (Teddington); J Wyatt (Reading), Soma Singh (Southgate, capt), R Garcia (Polo Barcelona); J Shaw (Southgate), Kalbir Takher (Cannock) R Thompson (Hounslow), J Laslett (Teddington), N Thompson (Old Loughtonians). Substitutes used: C Giles (Havant), S Hazlett (Hounslow) B Sharpe (Cannock).

SWITZERLAND: H Muller; T Grandchamp; B Steinemann, D Pfister, R Muggli; A Grasser, C Cavallet, S Bircher; M Heller, R Schmidli, T Haberthur (capt). Substitutes used: R Thoma, O Bilgerig, P Stutz.

Umpires: R St Rose (Trin) and M Gallivan (Wal).