London’s blue turf slow: Nobbs

BANGALORE: The dark ink-blue pitch at the Olympic hockey centre isn’t as true as has been made out to be. The ball whizzes across the carpet or bobbles depending on which way it is hit. This was Indian team’s chief coach Michael Nobbs’ observation after his boys had the first feel of the turf in London ahead of the May 2-6 four-nation Olympic test event.

“The ball runs very flat one way and the other way it bounces due to the way the pile of the turf stands. The pitch is also much slower and heavier and harder to run on. This is probably due to it being new. I am not sure if this will affect our fitness levels but let’s wait and see. We got to train on the main pitch. It is the same as ‘pitch 2’ and perhaps a little slower,” Nobbs told TOI.

Nobbs said the Indian team would take time to get accustomed to the pitch and hence, the four-nation event came as a blessing. “We will learn a lot about this pitch before the Olympics and this trip will be well worth it. What sets us and the other teams in the four-nation – Great Britain, Australia and Germany are the other three teams – apart is that until yesterday (Sunday) we had never set foot on a blue pitch while they have spent the last six months practising on it. This turf is very different.”

The coach added: “We are making unforced errors which we generally don’t do and this is primarily due to the turf. The slowness of the pitch is causing the balls to be intercepted much more, so our passing speed needs to increase. We need to get used to pushing the ball harder while passing and cut out some of the flamboyant stuff. It is here that the four-nation becomes invaluable to our preparation for the Olympics as we get to play three of the top four teams in the world,” he said.

The other factor that may hamper the Indians is the wet and cold weather conditions. “Even the English hate it,” Nobbs said. “We have just come from 38 degrees in India to 10 during the day. But the players haven’t complained yet!”

‘Olympic hockey centre not ready yet’

Indian team’s chief coach Michael Nobbs said that the hockey centre for the London Games is not completely ready as a lot of construction work is still on.

“It took a bit longer for the Indian team to get to the stadium for training as the road structure to be used for the Olympics hasn’t been finished yet. That led to a few detours before the team reached the ground,” Nobbs said. “There is a huge amount of construction going on and a lot of the areas we would like to have visited are still under construction,” he added.

“We trained on the second pitch initially as work on the first pitch is still going on to get it ready for the start of the test event. The stands have a capacity to seat 16,000 but only 12,000 will be let in for the test series as all the stands haven’t been put in place yet. The change rooms too are not ready but will all be ready by the Olympics.”