Training with boys helps girls toughen up

Ritu Sejwal, TNN

NEW DELHI: It’s been a long wait for the women’s hockey team which last qualified for the Olympics 32 years ago – for the Moscow Games. However, the past is not weighing heavy on the minds of the Indians players.

“Hame pata hai ki hum kar sakte hain (we know we can do it),” said India’s penalty corner expert Joydeep Kaur after the team’s practice session at the National Stadium on Saturday morning.

“There’s excitement in the camp. We all have the determination and have worked very hard for this,” she added.

Joydeep gets the confidence from India’s performance in Argentina where half of the senior players were nursing injuries. “We performed well in Azerbaijan without a lot of senior players. But now the top players are back, so we are ready for tougher encounters,” she said.

The Indian girls are ranked just behind South Africa in the qualifiers which will begin from February 18.

Coach CR Kumar desisted from making big claims and said rankings are mere statistics. “Every team is important. Ranking means nothing. We’ll be watching every team very closely to assess their strengths and weaknesses,” he said. “We are concentrating on strength training now. We need to play high tempo games in the qualifiers. The advantage of playing with boys is they don’t give room to move freely,” he said, referring to team’s practice match against the Jai Bharat academy.

“The girls are 90% fit and only Joydeep and Jaspreet have some minor issues,” Kumar said.

Kumar praised men’s team coach Michael Nobbs and former India captain Dilip Tirkey for stepping forward and guiding the women’s team. “Nobbs has worked with Japan’s women’s team and watches international hockey very closely. It’s always good to share ideas and get a different perspective. Other international teams also follow the mixed culture, including the Australian girls who train with their men’s team,” he said. “If the facilities are there we would love to have combined training in areas like running and exercising. Watching them (men’s team) play in training would help the girls a lot,” he added.

Meanwhile, Dr Satbir Singh says the girls have shown improvement in fitness standards. “The idea was to work on flexibility, speed and agility. We can see the difference in the players’ fitness level on the field,” Satbir said.