Consistency is Indian hockey team’s problem: Jamie Dwyer

PTI

NEW DELHI: Australian ace Jamie Dwyer was forthright in his assessment about the current India hockey team terming Sardar Singh and Co as an “inconsistent” bunch, who will have to depend a lot on ace drag-flicker Rupinder Pal Singh and comeback man Gurbaj Singh.

“Indian team keeps on improving but so does every other team in the world of hockey. They are not far off the best teams in the world but their consistency is still a problem, I feel. We will soon find out how good or bad they are,” Dwyer said.

On the duo of Gurbaj and Rupinder Pal, Dwyer, who has a whopping 150 strikes from 250 internationals said,” Gurbaj had a great HIL and so did Rupinder Pal. I expect these two guys will perform well for the Indian team.”

Dwyer hit the nail on its head when he stated that India needs to step up on their twin problems — conversion of penalty corners and being good defensively which includes saving the drag-flicks.

“I think any team that wants to perform well at the World Cup must be good defensively. As far as India is concerned they also need to have a very good penalty corner attack and defence,” he said.

India have been clubbed with defending champions Australia, England, Belgium, Spain and Malaysia in Pool A of the World Cup to be played at The Hague from May 31-June 15.

India will square off with Australia on June 9.

The 35-year-old also made it clear that the upcoming World Cup will be his last appearance at the marquee event even though he has not yet decided on calling time on his international career.

“It will be my last World Cup for sure but I’m still undecided when I will retire from international hockey,” said the veteran, who has played in three editions of Olympics and four WC for the national team till date.

The World Cup will also be a chance for the ‘Kookaburras’ to give a fitting farewell to their coach– the legendary Ric Charlesworth.

“Ric deserves to go out on a high and we hope we can do that for him,” said the former captain.

He also clarified that he never said that Australia should have a foreign coach but admitted that it is a likely scenario.

“I don’t think I said that “we should have a foreign coach” but I do think it is a likely scenario. I hope we get the best coach possible for the job, whether that’s foreign or local,” he said.

The Australian team has been preparing well and Dwyer hopes that his Cup swansong will be a nice one.

“Preparation has been going pretty good. We have been training hard and I’m hoping that we perform well at the World Cup. If we play to our potential we will have a chance of winning the tournament. We will be playing two games in England and a couple of practice games to get used to the European conditions before the World Cup,” he said.