Unwanted confusion over Indian women team head coach could have been avoided

Neil Hagwood was appointed as the assistant coach to the Indian Women’s hockey team

There has been a great deal of confusion over who is the India’s senior women team head coach after Hockey India announced that Neil Hawgood is returning to coach the national women’s team – a job he quit late last year to take up a coaching assignment in Malaysia.

The chaos was all pervasive since India already has a head coach in German Mathias Ahrens. Ahrens has joined the Indian coach job in May this year and it left all and sundry wondering whether Hawgood is replacing Mathias Ahrens as head coach of the national women’s team or is the Aussie going to serve as assistant coach to the German.

It was hard to fathom that a coach of Hawgood’s stature will serve as assistant to Ahrens. The German has did his bit with the women team as they qualified for the Olympics after a gap of 36 years during his tenure as coach. But there is little doubt that he is not in the same league as the Aussie. Hockey India could have avoided all the confusion by categorically stating the roles of both coaches. It now appears that Hawgood will be the head coach of the Indian senior women’s hockey team and Mathias Ahrens will serve as his assistant. Insiders say the German has no issue serving as assistant to Hawgood.

It may be worth recalling that the Indian eves have come up in leaps and bounds during the more than two years of Neil Hawgood’s coaching stint – the national team won bronze medals at the 2013 Asia Cup and the 2014 Asian Games – the Aussie also guided the Indian junior women’s team to a coveted bronze medal finish at the 2013 Junior World Cup.

It is learnt that Hockey India said the federation does not want to take any chances with Mathias Ahrens as head coach going into a major event like the Rio Olympics and quite obviously a coach of Hawgood’s pedigree would be a better bet for the women’s team. Of course, hockey is a game where all coaches play their part and it will be unfair to focus only on the head coach.

So obviously, Ahrens will do his job as assistant coach but the confusion over who is the head coach of the women’s team could have been avoided. “Hockey India should have made a statement saying Hawgood is returning to take charge as head coach. Of course, they did release a press note but it lacked clarity whether the Aussie is returning as head coach. This created all the confusion as people starting thinking that Hawgood will be Ahrens’ assistant, something hard to digest. I don’t think Hockey India has confidence in Ahrens to coach the girls in an event as big as the Olympics. I believe the assistant coach job should suit Ahrens fine,” says a source close to Hockey India.

The bigger picture looks great – Neil Hawgood as head coach and Mathias Ahrens as assistant coach augurs well for the Indian women’s team ahead of the 2016 Rio Olympics, but yes, all the confusion could have been avoided!