The Indian women's hockey team play the second match of their 2026 FIH Women's Hockey World Cup campaign in Amstelveen against South Africa this evening, and you can follow all the action live on ESPN.
India produced a resolute performance in their opener against Olympic silver medallists China to draw their opening match 2-2. India took the lead twice in that game, thanks to Navneet Kaur and Deepika but China responded with goals from Zhang Ying and Ma Ning.
With England having beaten South Africa 4-0 in the other first-round match in this group, a win today is absolutely imperative for Sjoerd Marijne's side. With China beating England in the other game in the group today, the equation is clear for India -- win their two games (by any margin) and they will make it through to the second group.
That is not to say South Africa will be pushovers, India will have to once again produce a repeat of the performance levels and intensity that they showed for most of that game against China.
Navneet Kaur and Deepika Sehrawat will once again be critical for India, in terms of goalscoring, but Marijne will be looking to the likes of Lalremsiami and Ishika as well, especially if India do repeat the performance of the first half against China, where they did create chances, but left things to be desired in terms fo their end-product in the circle.