Two years ago in Sheffield it was the Danes who spoilt the party for England when they beat the hosts in the final to deprive them of promotion to the European Indoor Trophy. This year it was oh so nearly their Nordic cousins from Sweden who did the same. There is no final this year, the women's Indoor Challenge being on a strictly round-robin basis, but dropping points in the third match of the tournament could have had dire consequences.
On paper England were by far the better of the two sides but, as we saw in 2008, the Swedes can play some good hockey. England had an early chance to go ahead when they were awarded a penalty stroke two minutes into the match, but Chloe Rogers flick was saved and England were unable to get onto the scoresheet until Chloe Strong converted a penalty corner five minutes before half time.
Although England looked the better of the two sides on the pitch, as well as on paper, they found breaking down the Swedish defence difficult, and a solitary Swedish goal in the second half may not have been of any significance except for the fact that England had failed to build on their one goal advantage. So the match ended at 1-1 and we all started to get our calculators out to check goal differences.
England were separated from Sweden at the top of the table, thanks to some high scoring in England's favour yesterday. England needed to build on this to maintain this cushion when they played their second match of the day, against Croatia.
Croatia had given Sweden a difficult game yesterday, but England took them on at the gallop. Natalie Seymour opened the scoring, with goals from Chloe Strong (2), Chloe Rogers (3), Gemma Darrington and Becky Herbert adding to the tally in a useful 8-2 win.
England play their final game tomorrow, when they take on Turkey, but promotion already looks in the bag. Perhaps exhausted by their efforts against England, Sweden fell 12-0 to France in their second match of the day, which puts England on 10 points, France on 9 and Sweden on 7.
Sally Walton is recovering in hospital from an operation to remove her appendix. Reports say that she is being well looked after in a Rouen hospital and is expect to travel back with the team on the coach. We wish her a speedy and full recovery.
More photographs from today's matches will be added to our site at www.HockeyImages.co.uk later this evening.
