After Graham Reid took over the reins of the Indian men’s hockey team, they have grown leaps and bounds with their biggest achievement being the Olympics bronze in Tokyo.
Post the Olympics though the results haven’t been upto the high expectations and controversy broke out when recently the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) president Narinder Batra, who is also the FIH president, shot off a letter to Hockey India (HI) president asking him to explain the team’s ‘unacceptable’ performance.
What followed were rumours that maybe Reid’s time was finally up. But the Australian coach met up with Batra earlier this week and all seems well for the time being. He will now hope to put all that behind him and make sure that the team does well against Spain in back-to-back matches in Pro League at Kalinga Stadium in Bhubaneswar on Saturday and Sunday.
The Manpreet Singh-led team has so far played four matches in the tournament and have won three and lost one. Although, they earned two big wins against South Africa, they suffered a shocking 2-5 loss to France. While it is true that world No. 12 France have improved in recent past; it was still shocking to see them beat the world No. 5 team quite convincingly.
With the Commonwealth Games and Asian Games, which also acts as an Olympic qualifier, all set to take place later in the year, the loss was quite concerning. But Manpreet Singh wants to put it in the past and focus on the matches at hand.
“We were disappointed with the loss against France but then we analysed it and we have moved forward. It’s in the past now and there’s nothing we can do about it. Our focus is now to do well against Spain and Germany and make sure we follow the lessons that we have learnt after the loss against France,” said Manpreet during a virtual press conference on Friday.
Meanwhile, Sukhjeet Singh from Punjab will be making his debut on Saturday and the skipper was all praise for the youngster. “Sukhjeet is a good player and will be making his debut on Saturday. He is hard working and very skilful and has a lot of potential,” said Manpreet.
Apart from Sukhjeet, another newcomer Abhishek, who made his debut in South Africa, will also look to impress, and cement his place in the squad ahead of the long season.
As for Spain, they lost to India at the Olympics and were knocked out in the quarterfinal stage. But with Max Caldas as their new coach, one can expect great things from them in the coming months. It hasn’t started too well though as they lost both their matches against England. Despite the losses the coach believes the team grew over the two days but was not rewarded for the effort.
Considering how well Caldas knows the Indian team one can expect some surprises in back-to-back matches but hopefully the Indian team will be able to counter that with their skill and experience.
Post the Olympics though the results haven’t been upto the high expectations and controversy broke out when recently the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) president Narinder Batra, who is also the FIH president, shot off a letter to Hockey India (HI) president asking him to explain the team’s ‘unacceptable’ performance.
What followed were rumours that maybe Reid’s time was finally up. But the Australian coach met up with Batra earlier this week and all seems well for the time being. He will now hope to put all that behind him and make sure that the team does well against Spain in back-to-back matches in Pro League at Kalinga Stadium in Bhubaneswar on Saturday and Sunday.
The Manpreet Singh-led team has so far played four matches in the tournament and have won three and lost one. Although, they earned two big wins against South Africa, they suffered a shocking 2-5 loss to France. While it is true that world No. 12 France have improved in recent past; it was still shocking to see them beat the world No. 5 team quite convincingly.
With the Commonwealth Games and Asian Games, which also acts as an Olympic qualifier, all set to take place later in the year, the loss was quite concerning. But Manpreet Singh wants to put it in the past and focus on the matches at hand.
“We were disappointed with the loss against France but then we analysed it and we have moved forward. It’s in the past now and there’s nothing we can do about it. Our focus is now to do well against Spain and Germany and make sure we follow the lessons that we have learnt after the loss against France,” said Manpreet during a virtual press conference on Friday.
Meanwhile, Sukhjeet Singh from Punjab will be making his debut on Saturday and the skipper was all praise for the youngster. “Sukhjeet is a good player and will be making his debut on Saturday. He is hard working and very skilful and has a lot of potential,” said Manpreet.
Apart from Sukhjeet, another newcomer Abhishek, who made his debut in South Africa, will also look to impress, and cement his place in the squad ahead of the long season.
As for Spain, they lost to India at the Olympics and were knocked out in the quarterfinal stage. But with Max Caldas as their new coach, one can expect great things from them in the coming months. It hasn’t started too well though as they lost both their matches against England. Despite the losses the coach believes the team grew over the two days but was not rewarded for the effort.
Considering how well Caldas knows the Indian team one can expect some surprises in back-to-back matches but hopefully the Indian team will be able to counter that with their skill and experience.
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