Indians miss flight after SAI bus arrives late
Kabir Mandrekar
The Indian hockey team, just off their first training camp under chief coach Jose Brasa, ran into a number of problems on Thursday on their way to New Delhi en route to a tour of Europe. First, the pick-up bus arranged by the Sports Authority of India(SAI) arrived late, then they took longer than expected in boarding it, and finally, they were not allowed to board the Kingfisher airlines flight because they had reached the airport only half an hour before the flight’s departure.
“Two buses were to pick us up at 4 am, but we were kept up till 5.15. We reached the airport at 5.42 (for the 6.15 flight) but the airlines duty manager said we were too late because we were carrying a lot of excess luggage. We proposed sending the luggage by a separate flight, but he flatly refused,” said Harendra Singh, who is a part of the coaching staff.
The team’s support staff said they had spoken to the airlines at 5 am regarding the team’s late arrival. “I was assured that it would be taken care of. But when we reached, another officer told Harendra that he could not allow 27 people with luggage to board the flight (at that time),” Manoj More told The Indian Express.
The team finally boarded a Jet Airways flight at 11.45 am, which resulted in the postponement of the Hockey India logo unveiling in Delhi by three hours. More disappointing for them, however, was that they could not visit injured goalkeeper Baljit Singh before their departure to England.
As the usual blame game started, with the team waiting at the airport, SAI deputy director (west zone), Virendra Bhandarkar, said it was the players who were at fault. “We sent two buses of which one was on time and the other was a little late,” he said. “I felt that a gap of one hour before the departure time was enough for the bus to leave Balewadi and reach the airport without any trouble, so I sent the first bus at 4.50 am. The second bus did take a little time, but some players should have left in the first bus itself. They took so much time to be seated and load their luggage that they were bound to be late,” he said.