Outside of the Olympics, hockey goes largely under the radar in Australia including here at Edge of the Crowd. However, currently, in India, the Australians have made it through to the quarter-finals of the World Cup and are looking good for a medal spot.

Australia could only manage silver at the last major tournament the Tokyo games but in India, Australia is looking to go one better and finally grab gold back.

If Australia does go on to win the tournament it will be their fourth title going equal with Pakistan for the most wins in Hockey World Cups.

Australia may have dropped the 2018 tournament but they did win in both 2010 and 2014 during what is largely regarded to be Australia's golden generation for Hockey.

With an Olympics coming up in just over a year now, this squad is largely going to be the same one that takes the Kookaburras to Paris in 2024. But for the next week, Australia will be solely focused on taking home the World Cup.

Australia began their pool A matches with a big win against France to set their tournament off with a good rhythm. That was before the most exciting match of the tournament.

A 3-3 draw with Argentina with Australia scoring in the dying minutes of the match to make sure they would finish with equal points.

The final match of the group stages saw Australia come up against South Africa. A solid win would see them get over Argentina in the group and finish first heading into the finals.

Nine goals were scored by the Australians to the South African's two in what was once again a dominant display by the Koookuburras. While the wins were excellent Australia certainly wasn't playing any of the stronger teams in this World Cup.

Australia is now set to come up against Spain tonight. Spain is a good team, a solid team but they don't have the ruthlessness in front of the goal that's needed to beat the Aussies.

Australia scored seven times from their 20 penalty corners in the group stage while Spain managed just one from 14 attempts. In seven previous head-to-head attempts, the Spanish have beaten the Aussies on just one occasion. Australia should be quite confident of getting through to the semi-finals.

A win in this match would see Australia go on to play the winner of the Netherlands v South Korea match in a few days. Australia will no doubt be hoping for an upset in favour of the Koreans with the Dutch being a difficult team to beat.

The Netherlands is also looking to equal Pakistan's record but it's the consistency that has proved successful for the Dutch. They have finished top four in all except one World Cup including finishing second in both 2014 and 2018.

While the matches are now on quite late for Australian audiences it;'s certainly worth following this competition even if it's through highlights in the morning. Australia is set to take on Spain at 10 pm AEDT tonight.

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