GBR caught on the counter attack against Hungary

Knowing they needed to win the match to progress to the semi-final playoffs, the Brits were determined to keep possession and attack.

But despite recording the most possession of any team in the women’s tournament and achieving their highest number of shots on goal, they were caught on the counter attack and suffered a 5 – 16 defeat.

The British team opened up the scoring for the first time in the tournament, with Pippa Temple scoring her maiden goal for GBR. The quarter remained close at 2-2 with less than three minutes left of play, before Hungary opened up a gap which their opponents were never able to close.

Temple added another goal early in the second quarter before a frustrating minute for Angie Winstanley-Smith with two shots saved off the line.

In front of an enthusiastic crowd of 5,200, GBR were unable to make the most of their possession and the eight exclusions in their favour during the fourth quarter.

Gibson-Byrne added a second goal during the quarter but this wasn’t enough to close the gap with the final score 5-16 (2-5, 1-3, 1-5, 1-3) to Hungary.

Head Coach Kostas Vamvakaris said: “Today was our worst game of the tournament. We went out knowing we needed to score but we gave the Hungarian team too much respect which led to too many easy goals on the counter attack.”

The team now play France in the seventh place play-off match at 14:00 BST on Tuesday 22 July.

France, who finished fourth in Group B, suffered heavy losses throughout the week against Italy (4-14), Spain (4-18) and Russia (6-18). However Vamvakaris has warned the team not to expect the match to be easy. He said: “On paper we are the better team but if we are not serious about the game we will have a problem.”

GBR goalscorers: Ciara Gibson-Byrne (2); Pippa Temple (2); Fran Clayton