Harendra Singh steps down
The junior national hockey team continues to suffer as the coach saga took another a new twist.
Harendra Singh, who was appointed as the chief coach of the colts barely a week ago, has quit from the post left the ongoing camp at the SAI Southern Centre in Bangalore on Monday, team sources said.
Harendra, who was sacked as the chief coach of the senior team in June, returned to the hockey fold last week when he replaced Olympian Mukesh Kumar as the juniors coach.
Mukesh was subsequently elevated to the post of senior team coach. Hockey India has reinstated Mukesh as the junior team coach on Tuesday, marking a third change of chief coach in a week’s time.
Harendra’s exit can be linked to his association with the World Series Hockey (WSH), where he was named as one of the eight coaches. WSH is an event organised by Indian Hockey Federation (IHF) who are on a warpath with ruling body Hockey India. “He can’t be involved in both the groups (HI and IHF). He had to choose between one and his decision was to take up the WSH offer. Hence, he had to quit as the junior team coach,” a source said.
Meanwhile, the IHF and HI met acting Indian Olympic Association president VK Malhotra in New Delhi on Tuesday in an effort to reach a compromise on the merger issue.
It is learnt that nothing concrete was decided and that the three parties would be meeting again in the near future.