He is extremely happy, but doesn’t express so in words. But his facial expressions do not escape from your eyes. He wants to sound rationale rather than seemingly exhuberent. Ebullient Indian chief coach Sojerd Marinje is, for all the purpose, sounds practical. He knows the job is only half done despite his team is placed far ahead of their rival in the quest for Tokyo. Today was of course India’s day but the repeat USA match could go either way. He knows. He knows it thoroughly. Therefore, his one sentence ‘It doesn’t happen always’ which came at the fag end of the long press conference after India crushing USA 5-1, carry much weight.

“I think we were very effective today. You cannot expect that always to happan. We are happy today but not sure it would happen again tomorrow. ‘It doesn’t happen always’. Marinje said in the post match chit-chat with the large contingent of pressmen

“You dream about fantastic results, but we were really effective today”.

Marinje also feels his team understands how significant is tomorrow’s match.

“We were up 5-0 and wanted to keep that score. But we fell back a bit too much and need to improve on that tomorrow. Girls were happy with the result but not extremely excited. They know we have to play to our potential”.

“we are not in the Olympics yet. No, absolutely not. You know how the process can go. You don’t get (Olympic) ticket to tokyo today. You can get it tomorrow. You have nothing so far. I am not busy with the result. It may be strange. If that were the case, my mindset would be wrong”.

“I think in the first 28 minutes, we struggled with nerves. We lost the ball too fast. We gave them too many oportunites. Luckily they didn’t make it, otherwise match would have been different”.

“Making use of opportunities is a quality, which we did pretty well today. You could see the nerves were gone and we played to our potential”.

Was the start of the match was slow for India as it struggled almost entire first half barring the relief in the 28th minute?

He has the answer

Yes we started slow but the answer to this Yes and No. I also experienced them with the men – the third-fourth place 2017 HWL Finals. We played Belgium and had no energy. So it was was the same. But I am happy we changed it. That’s the qualitiy of the girls”.

“Thats’what you can say. I think we were very effective today. The speed of Sharmila and Salima, 17 and 18 year old seting up the pace”.

Yes. I can sleep well today. As a coach you need to tick all the boxes to prepare a team for another day too.

Pic: s2h photographer Shamim Qureshy