"Not a medal, but won Indian hearts": Twitter hails Indian women's hockey team for courageous 4th-place finish at Olympics 

The Indian women's hockey team's quest to finish on the podium has come to an end. Despite giving it their all in the bronze medal match, the team were defeated by Great Britain (GB). The thrilling encounter went down to the wire but GB did enough to squeeze a 4-3 victory. Here's more on what happened during the thrilling encounter.

India lose bronze medal to Great Britain

The Indian women came agonizingly close to winning the match. After trailing the game by two goals, the team showed great character to make a comeback.

The first quarter was an even affair as both teams kept attacking. The deadlock was finally broken in the second quarter as GB scored a fantastic goal to take the lead. Just minutes later they added to the scoreline with another terrific effort. It was all India for a few minutes after GB's second goal.

The sensational Gurjit Kaur showed up brilliantly by scoring two goals from penalty corners to even the scoreline. Right before the end of the second quarter, Vandana Katariya poached a third goal to give India the deserved lead.

The Indian team were high on confidence after taking the lead going into halftime. However, they could not maintain their lead in the third quarter after GB scored a stellar goal, which even the sensational Savita Punia couldn't keep out. The penultimate quarter was always going to be a tricky affair.

Great Britain had 23 circle penetrations to India's nine in the entire match. GB's quest for the fourth goal bore fruit as Grace Baldson scored from a penalty corner. From there on, Great Britain dominated the game. They didn't let the Indians get a clear sight at goal. Despite all of their efforts to somehow take the game into a shoot-out, India came short against the 2016 Olympic gold medalists.

Fans react to the Indian women's hockey team's terrific effort

The result came as a big disappointment for the Indian team, who have been amazing this year. Their terrific run at the Olympics was inspirational as they had earlier suffered three defeats on the trot, but kept their campaign alive to reach the semis. Fans poured in with messages of appreciation for the incredible performance and effort put in by the players.