London Olympics: Bigger test ahead for Men’s hockey team

India coach Michael Nobbs piloted the hockey team’s return to Olympics in February this year and he now embarks upon another challenge to gauge the level of preparation of his wards for the London Games.

The Indian men’s team leaves for London on Friday to participate in the four-nation Olympic test event which has three of the world’s top outfits, including Australia.

With Australia, Great Britain and Germany in the fray, India’s chances do look bleak but the eight- time Olympic champions could not have asked for a better opportunity to test their strength ahead of the Olympics.

The matches will be played on bluecoloured pitches at the Riverbank Arena in London from May 2 to 6 and although India would have done better to get accustomed to the nature of the new turfs, Nobbs believes there’s still time for the team to make adjustments.

“Preparations have been as expected and as planned. The Olympic test event will be an opportunity for us to play on the blue pitches although the other participating teams have been practising on them for the last six months,” Nobbs told Mail Today on Thursday.

The Indian team was to practice on the blue- coloured pitches in Jalandhar but the Sports Authority of India (SAI) couldn’t get it ready in time.

However, playing against some of the best teams in the world and in the same venue which will host the hockey matches in Olympics would serve as an ideal opportunity.

“David John (team physio) and I have been planning everything for the last eight months and the results have been very positive. The fitness of the players has been improving. Now the question is

how good we are and the test event will tell us that,” said Nobbs.

“We have got nothing to lose as compared to the other teams who would be expected to do better. But of course, that doesn’t mean we will take it easy and allow us to be driven by those teams.
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“The level of competition would be high with Australia, which probably will win the gold at the Olympics, and then the other two teams will fight it out for the next two spots.”

Over the past few months, Nobbs has been rotating and experimenting players at various positions and has not shied away from taking some hard decisions which saw the ageing Rajpal Singh and Arjun Halappa being kept out of the Olympic qualifiers.

However, he justified his decision after the Indian team qualified for the Olympics.

The test event will again see India rotating the players and Nobbs hopes to iron out the deficiencies. India have rested Ignace Tirkey, who played a pivotal role in the midfield during the qualifiers, for the tournament and Nobbs does not want to put too much pressure on the 30- year- old’s body.

“Ignace is not getting younger and we didn’t want him to be overworked. He will be back for the Azlan Shah tournament which will be another important tournament for us.”