The habit of ball watching has to go

New Zealand and India are in the same pool of London Olympics. Their famed feat will be watched very keenly in two months time at the Olympics. It was therefore expected the duo would test each other thoroughly here in their Azlan Shah Cup opening match.

Indian national team chief coach Michael Nobbs always postulate and project a concept of ‘ruthlessness’. Which meant score mercilessly, as many goals as you want till the enemies’ energies and enthusiasm are extinguished.

This is one way of building your reputation in the international scene. Quite probably this is the kind of game most teams that are power to reckon with in the contemporary scene, resort to. No one is contended with mere winning the game, but the manner too counts in the long run. Unlike in the last decade, the current one witnessed one-sided matches quite often. With no offside rule in practice, goals can come any time at any moment. This ruthlessness was well in evidence.

Most of the New Zealander’s goals yesterday came in particular spells. In the first and last five minutes of first half and then three goals in the space of 8 minutes midway through the second half.

The scoring pattern, the scheme, the ones that India faced yesterday against the Kiwis’s are nearly analogous to what they faced against the same rival last year in the same tournament.

After an equal first half, the Kiwis pumped in five goals in 2011.

It clearly shows the New Zealand have found a formula to unlock and unknot the Indians. One of the aspect that helped them to achieve their goal is India’s wonted habit of ball watching.

The Kiwis took the lead within 30 seconds, and how?

Sandeep Singh, who was totally off-colour yesterday, was watching the ball inside the circle instead of chasing it out.

It was his thorough ball watching habit that led to India’s first goal. The coach had no option than to sideline him in the second half. As luck would have it, India has got a couple of penalty corners during that time, and Raghunath did not measure upto the task.

You cannot get just two penalty corners in the whole of the match, and then cannot find fault with a negotiator. A penalty corner is as good as the pusher, stopper, the negotiator gives only the finishing touch.

Whereas the Kiwis could manufacture as many as nine penalty corners, India did not show any proficiency in the department.

India did not do well in this area in London either, meaning they don’t earn bare minimum penalty corners, say 4 or 5, that would give enough leeway to the PC executioner .

There is something amiss the way our forwards function and go about it. A measure of amateurism is well evident. Ball rises quite often during long corners and hit ins. Mispasses are also galore. Off the ball running is much to be desired. Couple of well-conceived moves gone awry due to this harried passes, falling on the hands of hawkish Kiwis.

Some teams fumble in the first match, and then recover. The coach has said, and the captain has endorsed, that the team did not play to a plan especially in the second half. Now that they know where they went wrong, let us hope things improve from now.

Better late than never