Top players to miss MCC Murugappa Gold Cup hockey tournament

Chennai, Sep 29
Defending champions Air India will head a 10-team field in the All-India MCC-Murugappa Gold Cup hockey tournament, to be held here from Oct 1-11.

However, the organisers, who briefed the media here Monday night, seemed piqued that national players would not be available as the tournament dates clash Indian team’s tour of Canada for a Test series.

Tournament committee official B Vijay Kumar said: “We were under the impression that Indian players would be playing in this event. Only after giving us sanction of the event and the dates for it, Hockey India announced that the Indian players would be leaving for Canada.”

He said the organisers were hoping for an Indian development team to participate in the tournament that is classified as Grade A.

The other absentee is a representative Tamil Nadu state team that has always been a fixture in this competition.

Hockey India’s selection committee member Muneer Sait, also a member of the organising committee, said in view of “lot of bickering” in the faction-ridden Tamil Nadu Hockey Association, it was decided to invite only the league champions, Indian Overseas Bank.

Speaking on behalf of the sponsors, Arun Murugappan, managing director, Parry Enterprises, said the tournament offers Rs 1.5 Lakh in prize money to the winning team while the runners-up would receive Rs One Lakh.

The teams have been divided into two groups of four for the preliminary league. The top two teams will qualify for the semi-finals.

The groups:

Group-A: Air India, Indian Overseas Bank, Karnataka XI, Bharat Petroleum and ONGC. Group

B: Indian Oil Corporation, Army XI, Mumbai XI, Indian Railways and Punjab National