Yet again another lost hockey generation

Viren Rasquinha optimistic about India qualifying for next World Cup

Most of us hold him in high regard – his going to MBA school and all, being a doctor’s son, trying to do something for hockey. This is a typically inane statement being made by hockey players knowing fully well the lack of truth in it. Or is it really journalistic manipulation by the writer of that piece?

But an effort can be made to pinpoint the reasons for all this.

Player selection – role of the selection committee

One common thread in all our recent disasters has been a player like Sandeep Singh. He represents a prototypical Indian hockey player (missing “the basics”, so said coach Brasa) that singularly destroys a team. Misguided, mis-trained, wrongly encouraged, wrongly selected. He does have a bullet P C shot on his day, which is rare. But he has been at the heart of most of our disastrous performances over the years.

It is not surprising that this happens because it is natural for those around him to play very tentatively, what with his extremely poor defensive skills. His penalty corner prowess is handily overtaken by the amount of goals leaked by him, as also his extremely poor positioning. It can be rightly conjectured that he would’ve probably made a very good cricket player in the realm of a hitter like Yuvraj Singh, but is too slow for the rigours of an average hockey match.

This story can be repeated again and again with many players on the “current favorites of the selection committee list”. Time and again allegations of regional bias have surfaced. And does one forget easily the antics of one Mr. Jyotikumaran, the epitome of influence peddling?

Most selection committees have similar “scandalous stories”, like the current, incomprehensible reselection of the above-named and Shivender Singh in spite of a memorably disastrous Olympic campaign. Now that India is on the brink of not making a World Cup tournament, does any one of the committees or its members have the honesty or the integrity to own up to their mistakes, let alone resign?

It is inconceivable that both current foreign coaches, honest individuals as most foreign coaches are (fond memories of Jose Brasa) bear responsibility for these mis-selections, when the rest of India’s hockey players are purposely kept away from their watchful eyes.

When is the last time you saw Mr. Oltmans or Mr. Nobbs take in a local Murgappa tournament or Mumbai Gold Cup or the matches of the Karnataka hockey league? Yet we have seen on national TV football coaches going far and wide, including transatlantic voyages, just to watch a couple of players in important club matches. Also, is it fair to blame the administrators of Hockey India, when the arbitrators of the selection process are the selection committee?

Selection criteria

There are very few standards established for criteria of selection. Deselection of players is done on the basis of inane statements made to collaborate journalists in the press, and particularly in some hockey websites that act as virtual mouthpieces of the administration.

When data indicates that a particular player is fastest with the ball on his stick, then to deselect him with a unverified statement that he is slow, does not pass the smell test and opens the selector up to the criticism that he is interested in propagating certain individuals from his state.

Also, verifiable and published online standards would lead to transparency, whereby the deselected would get concrete reasons for their deficiencies. Deficient players would be weeded out and “wrong horses” would not be persisted on for years, a la Sandeep and Gurbaj.

What is urgently needed are players well schooled in the basics, all-rounders who can pass well and keep control of the ball and are primarily good defenders and tacklers. It’s also important that if players are replaced by others, they should decidedly be better than those who they’re replacing.

For example, the current midfield (with the exception of Sardar Singh) would be no patch on the likes of Vinay, Mahadik, Ravipal, and Cheeyena, and an open competition among these players, rigorously supervised with rigid criteria, would be the only way to decide this.

The conceptual thinking blunder

Again, it is amazing that time and again, comments about the Indian team performance have always centred around a weak defense, leaking penalty corners, weak defensive midfield, allowing too many circle penetrations, soft goals, and yet for some inexplicable reason, a considered decision was made to strengthen the attacking part of the team and play an Australian style of play.

But traditionally the Australian back 7, be it in a club format or international, have never been weak and their midfielders have always been their towering strength, a situation completely different from traditional Indian hockey teams, both at club and international levels, particularly in the last 30 years. Hence the statements of Mr. Nobbs that he would like India to play like Australia and then switching that statement to playing like Germany.

It can be rightly said that the style best suited for India would be a blend of the total hockey style of Holland with some traditional Indian/Pakistani touches in counterattack. So the die was cast two years back when European style hockey with Indian touches was abandoned for a more open Australian style. This compounded all our weaknesses and set us back even further from the gains made during the Brasa era. This blunder falls squarely on the shoulders of Hockey India.