Expert Comments: By Bodapati David

The Indian hockey team is a goldmine. Living hockey legend and the preset Australian hockey coach Ric Charlesworth may have missed a heart beat when India beat Pakistan. The prime-time, show-piece encounter on the inaugural day of the 12th Hero Honda Men’s World Cup Hockey Tournament whipped up emotions and raised visions of reviving the glorious past of Indian hockey. Alas, it was not to be as the 8-time Olympic gold medalists came crashing down to earth in the next match where the wounded Kangaroos, with Ric at the helm, handed out a comprehensive drubbing. The euphoria generated by the Media died too soon. And the Spanish Armada, too, made light of the Victory against Pakistan, by thrashing them and exposing their tactical and technical deficiencies which are being sorted out by another Spaniard, Jose Brasa, who is the foreign coach of India for this important assignment.

However, it would be unfair to the coach who seemed to have put the team on the right track. But like Charlesworth, who had a brief but unpleasant stint with the Indian team, he too is facing difficulties in understanding the dynamics of Indian sports set-up, where administrators, governments who pay for the team’s expenses and the coach’s salary, former players and Olympians, media, technical experts and finally the players themselves spinning in different directions. Under such professional atmosphere any coach who takes up position with the Indian Hockey team, or for that matter any Indian team, needs to be more than a professional. Just being a professional, like Charlesworth, will only increases the pressure and stress and if one cannot handle that, it would show on his coaching faculties.

As a journalist who is keeping tab on the Indian team, there are a numerous incidents that can be quoted which have psychologically and physically drained the Indian team but leaving aside all these negatives, let us see why the Indian team is a gold mine. Indians have amazing ball-control skills. They have a passion for hockey. They play an attacking game. The huge amount of player-base available in the country is perhaps the best in the world. No other country has such huge pool of talented players from which the Indian team is chosen. It is a challenge to any selection committee. If there are stories in the media that a particular panel is partial, it can be safely concluded that players with equal skills, equal talent, equal physical fitness abilities, equal in all aspects that are looked for, are eliminated because for every position we have ample choice of eligible players, who play at the highest level. For generations, we find many unsung heroes, who might have gone on to win Olympic gold medals, but they could not enter the Indian team. One opportunity missed, because of a bad selection policy or because of an injury and a life-time chance is gone and one has to remain just and ex-indian international and the Olympian tag eludes for life time. So players work hard for years and keep themselves fit and avoid injuries to be on the world stage for an Olympics or a World Cup. These are the two greatest events for any sportsman.

India’s ranking might be very low, but it’s the gold mine of a talent makes India one of the most-feared teams every time they enter a competition. Even if they are ranked 99th in the world, every top team, including the Numero Uno, will fear India when they meet them. They are so unpredictable and matched with their stick skills they pose a serious danger to every team that prides in their tactics and strategies, their methodology and efficiency. This one aspect also pits them as a dark-horse in every tournament. But alas, soon we are losing that tag too. If things continue to go the way they are going, India will find it extremely difficult to join the elite again. Time has come for us to learn from our former students who have surpassed us and now the “fear of India’’ is slowly fading. Coaches no more treat us with respect and it is very easy to chalk out a strategy, if the psyche of the Indian players remains the same, soon it will die.

Many might not like a post-mortem report or a review after just three matches but my humble attempt is to understand what the Indian team needs to do to stay in the tournament. With no hopes for a semifinal berth and only an outside chance, hoping others to lose, is not the way any player would like. Still beating England, who denied us a chance to play in the Olympics for the first time two years ago, is very important even if we have beat them in a smaller tournament after the forgettable Chile Olympic qualifier. A mishap that Indians fans will never forgive or forget. Winning the last match, too, is important. Only if we win both the matches, the outside chance can help us bring the luck provided we win both the matches and others lose. But the tournament is still open and we should make sure that we fight to enter 5th to 8th place grouping. Sometimes, the amazing crowd support eggs us to do entertaining things and our attacking style brings the crowd on to their feet but strategic hockey or defensive play might not please the crowd but may win us matches. For the crowd and the rest of the country, the tournament is as good as over but the players should realize that it is not so for them. If we enter semifinals, by a stroke of luck, we will still fight for the cup. But to be more pragmatic, the team should pool together and not lose heart. A fifth place for a 12th ranked team is still a good achievement. Many a time, India finishes in the bottom half after threatening to make it to the semifinals. After losing a chance to enter the last-four stage, the Indians get dis-heartened and it shows on the performance for lower-placing matches. But our future and the rankings for the next two years and will be determined by our performance here. World Cup and Olympics are two tournaments where we have to show that we are much better than our ranking.

Some lessons to be learnt and I am sure, the Indian Coach is looking into these aspects to keep up the mood in the team. There was a huge hullabullah when an Indian player was suspended for the dangerous play on the field. The mistake might have not caused injury to anyone, but had it been a serious bleeding injury, no one would have protested. But such punishments are important and the international Federation, like any other sports Federation in the world, treats safety as one of the important factors that promotes the sport. And hockey needs them too. Indian players, especially from northern India learn as part of their nurturing, these intimidating tactics and they continue even when they are playing for India. Unlearning them is very important and no national coach will waste his time on trivia like these. Players should understand that these immoral tactics cannot be hidden from umpires of international standards where assistance from TV is immense. The TV umpire, who decides after watching the replay while the game is stalled, is a permanent fixture whether we like it or not. These tricks will not only harm the player’s reputation but an yellow card or a suspension will affect the team’s chances very badly as they spoil the psychological state of mind of the team apart from reducing the numbers from which the coach can opt for different strategies. The other silly mistake, the Indian team had made in this tournament is “to continue play’’ after whistle is blown. These kinds of mistakes are not seen on a stage like World Cup by even minnows. Players who represent a country are expected to follow basic rules. I will leave comments on Development Coaching and High-performance coaching for another day.

Some of the Indian players who have acquired high-degree of modern European tactics have also been committing these silly errors which are dealt by only a development coach. But the first three matches have also displayed the amazing transformation the Indian team has undergone under coach Brasa in the last eight months.

Coach Brasa had managed to bring some qualities in the Indian team which was last seen only during the regime of Cedric D’Souza. Off-the-ball running, making use of the flanks, accurate passes, less unforced errors, releasing the ball on time, running into open spaces in the circle and effective marking, not just man-to-man marking, are some of the features which the Indian team displayed in glimpses during the India-Pakistan matches and the later two encounters with Australia and Spain. But we could not match with the top teams is a `given’ and the result proves it. Pakistan still plays the Asian style of hockey and only when we can mix the Indian skills with European tactics, India can once again rule the roost at the international level. Coach Brasa rightly said, that he needs another 18 months and hope the Indian government or the federation does not lose confidence in him after this World Cup.

I will conclude with a couple of examples. The Indian team today has used the `aerial pass’ or the `scoop’ in Indian parlance, very less and held possession of ball when used, except for an occasional miss. A couple of years back, the same pass was used more than a dozen times and 80 per cent of the time we used to lose possession of ball. Counter attack, as we call it, or a turn over in European language, is one of the potent weapons the European teams or even the Aussies use, to turn the tide. We too have used it but we are still succumbing to it when the opponents use it. Employing some of these “unconsciously’’ and moving into the right place at the right time and taking risk on the field is not just an innovative or imaginative thing anymore. It is a trained trait which is imbibed after continuous drills in the camps and if one can bring these to the field, there is no reason why the Indian team should remain in doldrums for long.
Bravo Brasa! Go India Go!!!