Birmingham(PTI): "Frustrated and angry" by the 'clock howler' during the Indian women's hockey team's controversial Commonwealth Games semifinal loss to Australia, coach Janneke Schopman said her side was left deflated and lost momentum after the incident.

The Hockeyroos set up the gold medal clash against England after a controversial 3-0 win over India on penalties here on Friday.

During the shootout, Australia's Rosie Malone missed her shot but to the dismay of the Indian team and fans, the forward was given a second chance as a technical official, B Morgan of England, had failed to start the clock on time.

Each player gets eight seconds to put the ball into the net in the shootout.

Given a second chance, Malone scored and that set the tone for the shootout as the Indians failed their first three attempts, while Australia converted all their chances.

"After that, we lost a little bit of our momentum. Then it did go in, and everyone is deflated," Schopman, a double Olympic medallist said.

"I'm not using it as an excuse, but when you make the save, that's an enormous boost for the team and you turn the decision around and the girls are really upset about it," she added.

Narrating the incident, she said: "The official's hand was up, but I didn't really know and the umpires -- A Church and H Harrison of England -- also did not. So, that's why I'm frustrated because the umpires said we have to retake it."

"I tried to calm them down. In hindsight it's 50-50 but I'm sure their focus was lost a little bit after that moment," a frustrated Schopman said.

The match had headed to penalties after both the teams were tied 1-1 at the end of regulation time.

"It's all human and all emotion. Should we be better? That's what I was trying to say, 'girls it doesn't matter, it doesn't matter'. But of course it does matter and of course I am angry also because I don't think even the officials understood what happened.

"They said it's not our decision. I said 'Australia are not complaining, they know they've missed it, it was easily 10 seconds and they got the opportunity to score'."

"I think those people just don't understand the game and the emotions that are involved."

India captain Savita Punia, however, played down the incident and said: "Maybe it was our hard luck in the shootout. We saved the first goal in the timeout but we're told that the timer didn't start only.

"This definitely played a part in the players' psychology. But we have learnt from our coach that all these things are part of the game. We tried to bounce back."

"Definitely, I'm sad about this. But I'm proud of the girls for making a comeback from being 0-1 down against a team like Australia. We had decided at half-time to go for that one goal and the team executed it perfectly."

Savita said their initial reaction was shock and disbelief.

"Of course, we are human beings. Yes, the next moment we realise that we cannot change it, can't give an excuse and can't fight for it. It happens sometimes.

"It was tough and we had to move on. But when we came to know about this, we thought how could this have happened? It has never happened in my career. It was a first for me," she added.

India will now play New Zealand in the bronze medal playoff on Sunday.

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Batumi (Georgia), Jul 26 (PTI): Young Indian International Master Divya Deshmukh held her nerves to hold stalwart Koneru Humpy to a draw in game 1 of the FIDE Women's World Cup final, with both players having their share of opportunities to take the lead here on Saturday.

The draw with black means Humpy, the two-time World Rapid champion, holds a slight edge going in the second and final game under the classical chess rules in the two-game mini-match, and should the deadlock continue, games of shorter duration will be played to determine the winner.

Humpy employed the Queen's gambit accepted as black and it turned out to be a pretty fascinating game right out of the opening as Divya, 19, came up with a piece sacrifice early to deny the black king the right to castle.

Humpy was the first to err and, according to computers, Divya had things under control on the 14th move. However in her bid to recover the extra material, the Nagpur girl, who has secured a place in the Candidates tournament with her sterling performance here, missed a promising continuation.

What followed the exchange of all minor pieces and the ensuing queen and rook endgame gave enough counter play to both players. The game was eventually drawn after Humpy sacrificed her rook to force perpetual checks.

"The game saw an extremely sharp battle with the game ending in a draw in 41 moves. On move 7, Divya made her aggressive intentions clear by offering another pawn,

which looked like home preparation. Humpy made a practical decision of refraining from taking the pawn and a balanced position was reached by move 10 by white," said Grandmaster Pravin Thipsay, an Arjuna awardee and the first Indian to get a chess Grandmaster norm.

"However, instead of developing the undeveloped Knight, Humpy retreated the centralised Knight on move 10, giving huge positional advantage to Divya. Divya could have gained huge positional advantage on the 12th move by moving a rook. However, she chose to play for King side attack by sacrificing a piece instead.

"Humpy, too, erred at this stage and instead of moving the King to Queen side, moved it to the King side. Divya, on move 14, could have obtained a crushing attack by threatening a mate by developing her Queen. Instead she chose to exchange a pair of Bishops first, which enabled Humpy to defend her King by returning the piece," said Thipsay.

"Players thus reached a balanced Queen and two Rooks ending. Divya continued to play ambitiously and tried to attack Humpy’s King but the latter defended accurately and the game was drawn in 41 moves by perpetual check," he added.

In the play-off for the third place, Chinese players Zhongyi Tan, the former women's world champion and top seed Lei Tingjie also decided to split points out of a Queen’s gambit declined game.

The opening raised visions of a close contest between the two but having been knocked out of title race in the previous round, none of them wanted to take any huge risk. It was still a middle game when the players shook hands.

With the top two positions sealed for the Indians, the berth to the next Candidates is also assigned, while the player finishing third will also get an entry to the premier event scheduled for 2026.

Results: Divya Deshmukh (Ind) drew with Koneru Humpy (Ind); Zhongyi Tan (Chn) drew with Tingjie Lei (Chn).