India’s Under-18 coach Romesh Panthania expressed satisfaction and happiness over his wards’ performance at the recent Singapore meet where India finished runners up behind Australia.
“The Singapore event was for the seniors. But we decided to field Under-18 team. My boys underwent a month’s training at Gurgaon. It was the whole teams’ first international assignment, and all of them traveled by air for the first time. However, the Pakistan and Australia teams were bit experienced. I learnt five Junior World Cup players were in the Australia team while players like Zuber, who played in our Premier Hockey League, appeared for Pakistan”.
“Over all, I am happy the way we played, especially against Pakistan in the opener and then in the final against the Aussies. We totally dominated the Pakistan match, and posted three goals in the first half without conceding any. In the next half also we pressed hard, but as luck would have it, three shots hits the posts and came back. Pakistan could manage two goals late in the second half, one by deflection of free hit and the other by converting a penalty corner. I found over all the Pakistan team was bit unprepared and was out of sorts.”
“Australians were lucky in the final, I should say. They scored two goals. The first one resulted when our defender at the top of circle hit the ball on a forward’s body while burying up the clearance. He tapped in in an one to one situation. The last goal of them was at the stroke of the hooter”
“I will give full marks to my defence who played well throughout the event. One of our forwards Dharamveer Singh was adjudged the Best Player of the Tournament, while another striker Vinod of Air India scored five goals, followed by drag flicker Rajinder Pal Singh, who had four goals in his kitty”.
The team will be assembling again at Gurgaon, and train further. They will take part in the forthcoming SN Vohra-Gurmit Memorial Tournament in Chandigarh in the first week of November.