Indian hockey still in a state of crisis

Stickwork

Gurbux Singh

I was thinking that the two warring factions — Hockey India (HI) and Indian Hockey Federation (IHF) — would bury the hatchet and work for the betterment of hockey. Instead they decided to work on an ad-hoc basis for the time being and that is not helping the Indian hockey much. The sports ministry did try their best to sort out the issue but even it could not do much.

Now, there are too many ambiguities and those ensure our hockey remains in limbo. Definitely future of India hockey is very tensed. There is no clear cut directive on who is calling the shots and the matter has been further complicated by the international hockey federation (FIH) who has refused to recognise this ad-hoc understanding.

That actually reeks of double standard. For, the apex body allowed the Hockey India to run the show on an ad-hoc basis for two years. Only last year the HI had an election and that too much drama. So when you can allow that to continue why now you are saying that this HI-FIH understanding is wrong. At whose behest they are taking such a stand? I am not sure about that. The FIH also is using the strong-arm tactics and threatening to take away the Champions Trophy and the Olympic qualifiers from us. If that happens then it will be bad and we should not let that happen.

Then you have this World Series Hockey thing, promoted by the IHF, and the FIH is firm on not allowing that. So what is the status of WSH? Will it really take off? Nobody knows.

The IHF, however, seem to be confident about the cash-rich tournament taking off. The way they paraded the national team players like Sardara Singh, Prabhjyot Singh, Rajpal Singh and Sandeep Singh during the unveiling of the WSH, it means they mean business and not wary of the FIH threat.

The hockey impasse is also hurting the associations, who are hosting different tournaments. The associations have to capitation fee to both the HI and IHF and given the fund crunch and escalating costs it’s costing quite a fortune. The associations are in the Catch-22 situation. Neither they can antagonise the HI since they have the FIH backing, nor can they rub IHF the wrong way. The confusion is really becoming too troublesome for the associations.

Talking about the Indian hockey team, captain Arjun Halappa will be missing next month’s Asian Champions Trophy due to a groin injury. It’s a big loss for the Indian team. Tushar Khandker also will not be part of the team due to an ankle injury. The player’s absence will definitely give new coach Michael Nobbs a headache as getting an apt replacement is a huge task.