Australia lose to Britain in FIH hockey

The Kookaburras have suffered their second setback in their FIH Pro League hockey campaign with a shock 4-3 penalty shootout loss to Great Britain in London.

League leaders Australia twice came from behind with goals from Jake Harvie and Tim Bland cancelling out strikes from the hosts' Zach Wallace and Chris Griffiths to secure a 2-2 draw at fulltime on Sunday.

But Blake Govers and Daniel Beale were both denied by England keeper George Pinner from the penalty spot in the upset.

Kookaburras head coach Colin Batch says his side had failed to finish strongly after finding momentum in the third quarter.

"We found it difficult to establish our game in the first half, while our third quarter was very good. We needed to do more with the opportunities we created and our momentum really stalled in the last quarter," he said.

"There were some great lessons for us to take into our future matches in Europe."

The match started with high tempo, end-to-end hockey before Zach Wallace nudged past Australia goalkeeper Tyler Lovell in the seventh minute.

Five minutes later Harvie made a run from deep in his own defensive half to Britain's goal and slipped the ball between Gibson's legs into the net

The hosts then had a spell of penalty corners with Griffiths latching into the third one to put his side into the lead.

But Australia's Tim Brand managed to convert his left-hand lunge to level the scores in the 36th minute.

The Kookaburras tried to keep up momentum, despite being down a man with Tom Craig's yellow card in the 55th minute, but couldn't find a way through.

Australia are still topping the table with 23 points, three points ahead of the second-place Netherlands, with a game in hand.

Belgium are third on 19 points, while Great Britain are one point back in fourth.