India will look to make it two wins out of two when they play Canada in the Hockey World League Semifinal on Saturday.
Roelant Oltmans' men saw off a challenge from Scotland in their first game, coming out with a 4-1 win to begin their tournament in the manner they wanted.
That result looked unlikely for a while, after Scotland opened the scoring via Chris Grassick early in the game, and it wasn't until the third quarter that India found the equaliser, winner and the safety goals.
Ramandeep Singh was the man to come to India's rescue, scoring that all-important equaliser, which ended up deflating the Scotland resistance and opened up the rest of the scoring for India. Ramandeep, who would finish the match with a brace, revealed it was a stern team talk from coach Oltmans that inspired the turnaround in the second half.
"We knew we didn't start well," captain Manpreet Singh said. "But coach gave us that confidence during the break saying there's still 30 minutes to go and nothing is lost yet.
"He asked us to bring more energy and aggression into our game. He reminded us about the strategic planning we had made ahead of the match against Scotland and asked us to execute it and not think of the misses we had in the first two quarters."
India will be fancied to beat Canada as well, and they will want to put up a much better performance, not just to take all the points, but also to build some much-needed confidence, because after this match is the big one against Pakistan, on Sunday.
"We play with no pressure," Manpreet added. "We just want to perform to our potential and enjoy ourselves while we give it our best."
Beat Canada well, and India will go into the Pakistan match in the best possible frame of mind. The last thing they will want is to put themselves under extra pressure by suffering a poor result against the Canadians. So, getting a win, and an impressive one at that, will be vital.
When and where to watch live
India vs Canada is set to begin at 6.30pm IST, 2pm BST.
The match will be shown live in India on Star Sports 2, with live streaming on Hotstar.
BT Sport will show the match live in the UK.
