Slovakia demolish fatigued Singapore 11-2 in Women’s World Floorball Championship

SINGAPORE – Despite putting up a valiant fight in their quarter-final play-off against Slovakia, the gulf in standards was simply too wide for hosts Singapore to overcome at the Women’s World Floorball Championship.

The world No. 6 Slovaks, who were held 2-2 in the first period, pulled away to eventually seal an 11-2 victory against 13th-ranked Singapore at the OCBC Arena on Dec 6.

But, while the Republic did not make the quarter-finals, Singapore coach Lim Jin Quan has another target to aim for.

He said: “In many interviews before, the players said they want to reach the top eight, but personally I have always been looking at top 10 and I also hope to finish off as the top Asian team.”

That remains an achievable target when they face world No. 12 Japan in the 9th-12th place play-offs on Dec 7. The Japanese lost 8-5 to Latvia in another quarter-final play-off on Dec 6.

Singapore can yet record their best finish in the current format of the biennial tournament, which came in 2019 when they were 12th out of 16 teams.

In 2021, they placed 14th, while Slovakia finished sixth.

Yet during the first period on Dec 6, it was an even affair between both sides. The Slovaks had the ball in the net in the fifth minute, but the whistle was blown half a second earlier for a clash of sticks.

Singapore’s Jerelee Ong had the best chance to open the scoring in the seventh minute. She went through on goal, only to fire her shot wide.

But four minutes later, the Republic drew first blood through forward Siti Nurhaliza, who slammed the ball home following a counter-attack.

Slovakia equalised in the 17th minute, with Kristina Belicova capitalising on a misplaced pass by the Singapore defence. They took the lead two minutes later when Jana Troskova redirected Klara Grossova’s pass into the net.

The hosts gave the home spectators among the crowd of 300 something to cheer about when Mindy Lim equalised right before the break.

Shortly after the restart, though, Singapore were stunned by two quick-fire goals. Slovakia took the lead when Paulina Hudakova’s shot rebounded off the post and went in off Singapore custodian Shazana Noor five minutes into the second period.

Barely a minute later, Kristina Hudakova made it 4-2 with a venomous shot into the roof of the net.

Buoyed by their advantage, the Slovaks turned up the heat and went on a scoring spree, with Kristina scoring her second in the 32nd minute before Linda Pudisova (34th), Troskova (44th), Lenka Cervena (52nd), Alzbeta Durikova (52nd), Michaela Zikavska (56th) and Laura Chupekova (59th) completed the blitz.

If not for Shazana, who was named Singapore’s Player of the Match for her match-high 42 saves, Singapore, who were missing the injured Yeo Xuan and Lim Jie Ying, would have lost by a bigger margin.

Coach Lim added: “The game today was very tight at the start and I think the cumulative fatigue and everything is definitely a challenge and with injuries, when players start to be a bit shaky in terms of performance, there’s just not enough replacements available.”

Despite the defeat, Siti believes it was a good experience, adding: “It’s not every time that we get to play against good teams like Slovakia.

“It’s the fourth day of competition and I think we still tried our best to give a good performance and good fight.”

Slovakia coach Michal Jedlicka had much praise for Shazana, saying: “It was very tough because Singapore’s defence was very good and we didn’t have much space to attack. It was a very, very good organised defence from Singapore.

“But we played better as the game went on, creating a lot of chances and getting a little bit better in our shooting and the Singapore goalie did a really good job.”