USA Field Hockey News

Minke Booij holds up the World Cup trophy following The Netherlands' 2-1 victory over Australia.

Netherlands Wins Field Hockey World Cup

MADRID (10/08/06) –  The Netherlands scored three second half goals to break to defeat Australia, 3-1 and win the women's field hockey World Cup.

Maartje Paumen scored two goals, including a penalty stroke with four minutes remaining to lead the Dutch to the win.

The win was the sixth World Cup championship for The Netherlands and the country's first since 1990.

In the third-place match, Argentina scored three goals in the first 13 minutes on its way to a 5-0 win over host Spain.

 The USA placed sixth at the World Cup for its best showing at the event since a third place finish in 1994 and marked the country's third top-six finish since the team made its World Cup debut in 1983. The USA's run through the tournament included a win over Olympic gold medalist Germany, victories over No. 7 Korea and South Africa. The team lost its first two games of the tournament to bronze medalist Argentina and silver medalist Australia before going 3-1-1 to conclude the tournament.

In other honors awarded by the FIH, Minke Booij of the Netherlands was named WorldHockey Player of the Year and Mi Hyun Park of Korea was named WorldHockey Young Player of the Year.

For the World Cup tournament, the USA's Amy Tran was named Goalkeeper of the Tournament while Sylvia Karres was honored as the tournament's top goal scorer with six goals. Spain's Nuria Camon was named the player of the tournament and Argentina's Carla Rebecchi was named the Young Player of the Tournament. South Africa was awarded the Fair Play trophy for sportsmanship.

Final World Cup standings: 1. Netherlands, 2. Australia,  3. Argentina 4. Spain, 5. Japan, 6. USA, 7. England, 8. Germany, 9. Korea, 10. China, 11. India, 12. South Africa

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