Netherlands – Australia 0-0 (0-0 halftime)
Australia learned an important lesson today against the Netherlands. When you come up against a hot goalkeeper, no amount of spectacular hockey can save the day. And so in the a key game in Pool B with the two top teams, Australia had to settle for a 0-0 draw despite playing a solid 70 minutes of hockey.

The two teams are familiar foes, it was a meeting between the 2011 Champions Trophy gold (AUS) and bronze (NED) medalists, and the London 2012 Olympic silver (AUS) and bronze medalists (NED). In this meeting the teams lived up to their medal status, as it was a show of skill and athleticism.

Goalkeeper Jaap Stockmann was the man of the hour for the Dutch. His acrobatic saves single-handedly stymied the Australian offense, including stopping near double-digit penalty corner chances.

There was no shortage of action in the first half as the teams treated the crowd to end-to-end action that featured multiple scoring chances. Stockmann definitely saw more of the action in the first half as the Aussies spent much of the half testing him. Stockmann made his mark late in the half when he made three consecutive saves on Christopher Ciriello drag flicks.

Stockmann opened the second half right where he left off, thwarting the Australians, who became more persistent in their attack on the Dutch net. Australia continued to generate penalty corner opportunities, but could not find the back of the net, often shooting wide in a bid to beat Stockmann.

As time wound down, the Australian crowd watched in disbelief as their team had to settled for a a scoreless draw, despite the hard-fought, dominant performance of the Aussies. It was only the eighth-ever scoreless game in Champions Trophy history.