Air-India to the fore

The teams that took part in the tournament displayed the essence of competition, making the whole event worthwhile, writes S. Thyagarajan.

The MCC-Murugappa Gold Cup hockey tournament, revived after a year’s hiatus, had a successful run, giving the Chennai spectators some spell of sports activity. The tournament is to Chennaiites what the Gold Cup is to Mumbaikars, the Beighton Cup is to Kolkatans and the Nehru Memorial is to Delhiites. Given the professionalism and the backing of one of South India’s biggest corporates, it wasn’t surprising that everything went off well with clockwork precision.

True, there were apprehensions in the context of the confusion prevailing in the governing structure of the sport. The event was staged with the blessings of the Indian Olympic Association’s hockey ad hoc committee and had generous inputs from the members of the organising unit, Arun Murugappa, B.Vijay Kumar and former Olympian Munir Sait.

However, to the die-hard hockey fan, it mattered little as to who ran the show so long as the game showed no signs of decay which, many believe, is likely to happen especially after India had missed the Beijing Olympics. The Tournament Committee was fortunate enough in roping some highly-rated teams, including IOC, BPCL and a combination from Indian Airlines and Air-India that played under the Air-India banner.

Quite conceivably, Air-India, which won the trophy and a cash prize of Rs.150,000, managed a formidable combination, lining up several renowned players. That it won the title via the tiebreaker only underscored the challenge offered by IOC under the leadership of Deepak Thakur. Ironically, it was Thakur’s amateurish push off the final stroke — the tenth — that was responsible for IOC finishing runner-up.

Air-India was well served by the gangling flicker and defender Sandeep Singh, with solid support from Dilip Tirkey. With a mid-field featuring stars such as Gurbaj, Vikram, Vinay and Prabodh and a frontline composed of Shivendra Singh, Arjun Halappa and Bruno Lugan, Air-India was almost a national squad. Its success did not surprise many, especially after it emerged as the top team in Pool B.

IOC was equally well balanced. Rajpal Singh and Prabhjot Singh, helped well by Inderjit Chadha, did the star turn for the team. However, there was a big question mark on drag flicker Raghunath’s consistency or the lack of it.

The third force in the tournament was the Army XI, led commendably by Ignace Tirkey. Some of his goals were bewitching.

The biggest beneficiary though was the local league winner, IOB. Not many had given it a chance after it went down fighting 2-3 to IOC on the opening day. But the team, profiting from the flair and fervour of Adam Sinclair, the finesse and fluency of Vinod Rayar, the solid and sustained work of Senthil in the mid-field and some excellent goalkeeping by Sreejesh, performed beyond expectation to enter the semifinal.

Overall, the teams on view displayed the essence of competition making the whole event worthwhile. It was nice to see the young lads from Orissa Sports Hostel making an impression and the mingling of old and new stars.

BPCL’s Amar Ayyamma drew a lot of attention for his power-packed drives inside the circle, as did Karnataka’s Sandeep Michael through his sense of opportunism.

A sideshow that helped to increase the spectator turn-out was the lucky dip organised by the Murugappa Group. The chief guest of the day drew the lots after the matches and those who had the lucky numbers received gift hampers. And further, a brand new bicycle, worth Rs. 3,000, was also on offer for a particular number drawn on each day!

It was interesting to see that the top brass of the Murugappa Group was present for the majority of the matches. It clearly reflected the Group’s enthusiasm, commitment and the desire to promote hockey.