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A sensational Simon Child lone effort has helped New Zealand do something no other team has done at the Hockey World Cup - take a point off the home side.
Child scored with seven minutes to play in The Hague this morning to draw 1-1 with the world No 2 Dutch.
The New Zealand-Netherlands match was the last pool game of the tournament and before the match, both the Dutch men's and women's teams had won all of their games.
The home side had earlier gone ahead in the eighth minute through Valentin Verga, though the Black Sticks stayed in touch throughout.
New Zealand's semifinal hopes were already over courtesy of losses to Argentina and Germany, and regardless of the outcome of this morning's encounter they were already set to play Spain in Saturday night's playoff for seventh and eighth.
All they could do was affect who the Dutch played in the semifinals.
An upset win against the Dutch would have left the home side with a semifinal date against world No 1 Australia.
Instead they would go into their semifinal as favourites against the No 4 ranked English while Argentina (No 11) would take on Australia in the other.
It was the Kiwis' best performance of the tournament and despite going behind early, never looked out of the match.
The Dutch found the back of the New Zealand net for a second time late in the first half.
New Zealand asked for a review which initially looked inconclusive, but the television umpire ruled the ball had come off a Dutch foot and the goal was disallowed.
Andy Hayward had already scored six goals from penalty corners at the tournament, but was unable to find the back of the net from either of the side's first half short corners or their second half effort.
He did force Dutch goalie Jaap Stockmann into two handy saves.
Then up stepped Child.
Playing his 205th test, Child received the ball in midfield, calmly waltzed into the Dutch circle beating three players before swivelling and slamming a shot past Stockmann to level the match.
SCOREBOARD
Netherlands 1 (Valentin Verg) New Zealand 1 (Simon Child) HT: 1-0.
- Stuff
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