It’s official: It is Kaushik

The onus has fallen on MK Kaushik. The present women’s coach will be the Man Friday for men’s team.

MK Kaushik of ‘golden boot’ fame will be assisted by Ramandeep Singh, Harendera Singh and AB Subbaiah as his deputies.

The official announcement is expected to be made tomorrow.

A brief profile of MK Kaushik

I represented the combined Universities in 1972. I earned the nation’s colours in the 1975 Afghan tour which was followed by Quide-e-Azam Cup in Pakistan. A 4-nation in Malaysia, the Esanda World Cup in Australia and the Pre-Olympics tournament in USSR followed before I became one of the proud gold medalist of the 1980 Moscow Olympics. Next year, I was part of the Indian’s Europe tour and then the Bombay World Cup.

My international career came to a happy end with a silver medal at the Asia cup in 1982.
With about 60 caps as a right winger, I completed hockey coaching course in the National Institute of Sports, Patiala, After brief stints of coaching my then employer Tata Sports Club team and then the IFFCO team, I served as an assistant coach to the national men’s side in 1989 and 1990.

I was elevated to the helm of coaching for the Indian girls thereafter. In the four years tenure between 1991 and 1994, I built a crack team from the scratch, training them for 48 international matches involving 11 tournaments / test series.

I was made the chief coach for the Men’s side in July 1998. I trained them for two tournaments – Kuala Lumpur Commonwealth Games and Bangkok Asian Games, in a tenure that lasted for five months.

The team won the Gold after a gap of 36 years and is now history.

Excerpts from ‘Golden Boot: Triumph and trauma of a coach’, co-authored by MK Kaushik and K. Arumugam

COACHING RECORD OF KAUSHIK IN MEN’S HOCKEY

Matches trained: 13
Matches won by India: 10

Achievements in women’s hockey

Asia Cup bronze 1993
Asia Cup Gold 2004
Afro-Asian Games Gold 2003
Asian Games Bronze 2006