France booked their place in the semi-finals of the FIH Hockey Men’s Nations Cup with a 2-0 victory over Ireland in Cape Town, South Africa, on Saturday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the day’s other fixture, hosts South Africa kept their semi-final hopes alive with an emphatic 4-0 win over the United States, setting up a decisive final round of pool matches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ireland 0 \u2013 2 France<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n France prevailed 2-0 in the battle of the unbeaten sides to top Pool B after a second victory in as many games.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Irish enjoyed much of the possession and created the better chances in the first half, but it was France who took the lead, largely against the run of play.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After some patient build-up, they worked their way into the Irish circle and, while Corentin Sellier\u2019s initial shot was saved, he pounced on the rebound, popping the ball up and across goal for Xavier Esmenjaud to fire home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Thimoth\u00e9e Cl\u00e9ment had the chance to double the lead in the final minute of the half, but his effort was well saved, ensuring the French took a 1-0 advantage into the break.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ireland earned their first penalty corner of the match within five minutes of the restart, but it was comfortably dealt with, and France were soon back on the attack. Xavier Gaspard smashed the ball in from the edge of the D, with Cl\u00e9ment applying the vital deflection to make it 2-0.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The French took control of the final quarter, although Ireland still created a couple of golden opportunities to get on the scoresheet. However, goalkeeper Corentin Saunier ensured France maintained their two-goal cushion, producing an excellent save before denying Ireland again from a penalty corner moments later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n French captain Fran\u00e7ois Goyet was named Player of the Match and said: \u201cWe\u2019re really happy. We wanted six points. Now we focus on the last pool game because it\u2019s really important. We want to win every game in this tournament, that\u2019s why we\u2019re here.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n South Africa 4 \u2013 0 United States<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n South Africa bounced back from their defeat at the hands of the French with a 4-0 victory over the United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The South Africans enjoyed the bulk of the possession in the first quarter but were unable to make it count in the early stages of the match. The home side eventually made the breakthrough in the 13th minute when Calvin Davis fired home from a penalty corner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They continued to control proceedings, but the American defence managed to keep them out. The half-time statistics painted a clear picture, with South Africa enjoying 66 per cent possession, recording 17 circle penetrations to the USA\u2019s seven, and seven shots on goal compared to just two from their opponents. Despite their dominance, the lead remained just one goal at the break.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sihle Ngubane then picked out Ayakha Mthalane, who turned smartly and slotted home to double South Africa\u2019s advantage in the 36th<\/sup> minute, making amends after missing a gilt-edged chance in front of goal just moments earlier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mthalane was back on the scoresheet midway through the final quarter, netting his second international goal in style with a powerful strike from the edge of the circle. And Kenton Melville then put the result beyond any doubt when he struck one in from a penalty corner as the host nation wrapped up an important 4-0 win to keep their semi-final hopes alive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sihle Ngubane was named the Player of the Match and said: \u201cYesterday we just took some time to rest, reflect, watch videos and do our homework and just take a step forward towards our main goal\u2026 The crowd today was phenomenal. That helped us a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" France booked their place in the semi-finals of the FIH Hockey Men’s Nations Cup with a 2-0 victory<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13786,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[60],"class_list":["post-13785","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","tag-hockey"],"aioseo_notices":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/France-hockey-.jpg",2002,1127,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/France-hockey--150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/France-hockey--300x169.jpg",300,169,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/France-hockey--768x432.jpg",640,360,true],"large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/France-hockey--1024x576.jpg",640,360,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/France-hockey--1536x865.jpg",1536,865,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/France-hockey-.jpg",2002,1127,false],"morenews-large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/France-hockey--825x575.jpg",825,575,true],"morenews-medium":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/France-hockey--590x410.jpg",590,410,true]},"author_info":{"info":["admin"]},"category_info":"International<\/a>","tag_info":"International","comment_count":"0","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/France-hockey-.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13785","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13785"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13785\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13787,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13785\/revisions\/13787"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13785"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13785"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13785"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}