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Australia on top in Champions Trophy

Olympic men's field hockey champions The Netherlands were virtually knocked out of Champions Trophy contention after crashing to a 2-1 defeat against hosts Australia.

With one point from three matches, the Dutch need to win their last two round-robin games and hope for a miracle in other results.

Australia's win took it top of the table, with nine points from three wins, while South Korea were second, on seven points. Spain moved into third position, on four points, with a 3-0 win over England earlier in the day.

In the women's competition, Germany surprised arch-rival The Netherlands 3-2, completing a miserable day for the Dutch. Argentina improved its chances of reaching the final by beating South Korea 2-0.

Dutch men's captain Stephen Veen was furious at the match refereeing, claiming his side was denied a crucial penalty-stroke late in the game.

Troy Elder scored the first goal from a penalty-corner flick in the 13th minute and Stephen Davies produced a piece of magic to score on half-time, after Jacques Brinkman had equalised with a penalty-stroke in the 32nd minute.

At half-time,Australia led 2-1. When both teams returned to the field they were out to win the game. Even though no team increased their score after half-time, both teams were determined and this made the match one of the best spectacles of this tournament.

Australia earned three penalty-corners and had nine shots at goal as compared to 6 and 15 by The Netherlands.

In the other match, Juan Escarre scored a goal in each half, and Eduard Tubau added a third, as Spain sentenced England to its third loss from as many matches and ended its final hopes.

Spain should have won by a much bigger margin but their forwards failed to make the best of the many opportunities they had to score

With only five minutes of the match remaining, England got the opportunity to get a goal on the board when a penalty-stoke was awarded. But Russell Garcia was foiled.

Despite Escarre's double, he received a post-game blast from coach Toni Forrellat, who said his star striker was playing at just 65 per cent capacity.

Forrellat said Escarre had become a mental victim of the controversial foot change rule, which allows umpires to allow play-on if the balls accidentally strikes a foot or a body an infringement which used to be an automatic infringment.

In the women's match between Germany and The Netherlands, both teams started aggressively and were determined to be the first on the board. Although the ball did enter into each of the goal circles many times, it was Germany who managed to penetrate the opponent's defence, following which Melanie Cremer scored in the 34th minute to put Germany 1-0 up.

In the second half, both teams played hard, with Germany utilising the interchange rule continually. In the 50th minute The Netherlands's Fleur van de Kieft took a shot at the goal and made the score 1-1. A minute later, Germany's Nadine Ernsting-Krienke scored at the other end of the field restoring Germany to a 2-1 lead.

Caroline Casaretto struck at goal once again to put Germany 3-1 ahead. With seconds to go, The Netherlands were awarded a penalty-corner from which Ageeth Boomgaardt scored to reduce the margin.

The Netherlands' women's team coach Tom Van 't Hek accused his team of lacking heart after it lost to Germany, but said it should rebound for the decisive final pool match against Australia on Thursday.

"In 70 minutes we broke down everything we had built up over the last five days of the tournament,'' Van 't Hek said. "I was astonished to see them play like that. It was a very bad performance.''

Olympic silver medllist South Korea slumped to its third loss from three games as Argentine captain Karina Masotta sealed the win with a goal in the final minute.

South Korea fired in an unsuccessful protest after captain Lee Eun-Young had a goal disallowed which would have leveled the scores with six minutes remaining against an Argentine team struggling to hold out its attacking raids.

American referee Renee Chatas ruled that Lee struck the ball from outside the circle and the captain debated the point heatedly while the clock ticked down.

South Korea then threw everything into attack, leaving Masotta to slam home the final goal after she was left virtually unattended near the halfway line.

Argentina's first goal came from Alejandra Gulla in the 46th minute, allowing Argentina to remain in the gold medal hunt, even though coach Sergio Vigil was unimpressed with his team's performance.