India placed in tough Pool B at Hockey World League Final, to face Australia in opener

HWL Final — Image Source : GETTY IMAGES Manpreet Singh and Valentin Verga battle for the ball in HWL Semi-finals

Hosts India are placed in a tough Pool B along side current world champions Australia and reigning Olympic bronze medallist Germany in the men's Hockey World League (HWL) Final to be held in Bhubaneswar from December 1 to 10.

Besides India, World League champions Australia and Germany, Pool B also features seventh placed England, who are the reigning bronze medallist in the Euro Hockey Nations Championship.

According to the schedule announced by the International Hockey Federation (FIH) today, India will open their campaign against the mighty Kookaburras on December 1 before taking on England (December 2) and Germany (December 4).

Pool A, meanwhile, consists of Olympic champions Argentina, European champions Netherlands, Olympic silver medallists Belgium and Spain.

European rivals Germany and England will get the event off to a flier at the Kalinga Stadium before the India- Australia duel.

In what is being billed as 'Super Saturday', December 2 is set to be a thriller with some eagerly anticipated matches scheduled.

A rerun of the 2016 Olympic gold medal match between Argentina and Belgium gets the day underway in a match that is bound to rekindle some fond memories from that special night in Rio just over a year ago.

The Pool stages will run from December 1-5 and will be followed by the quarterfinals on December 6-7.

Following that classification matches, semi-finals will take place over the next two days before the bronze medal match and Final on December 10.

Pools:

Pool A: Argentina, Belgium, Netherlands, Spain

Pool B: Australia, India, Germany, England

Schedule:

December 1: Pool B 16:45 (IST) GER - ENG

Pool B 19:30 (IST) AUS - IND

December 2: Pool A 12:00 (IST) ARG - BEL

Pool A 14:00 (IST) NED - ESP

Pool B 17:30 (IST) GER - AUS

Pool B 19:30 (IST) IND - ENG