Hockey losing charm

Nothing seems to be going right for the Indian hockey. Even as there was a glimmer of hope with the golden triumph at the 17th edition of Asian Games in Incheon, suddenly it seems like it was more of a mirage. The coveted Champions Trophy, which is underway at Bhubaneswar, has shown that Indians can be anything but consistent at the top.

In a way, what has been dished out in the three league outings has been disastrously demoralising, to say the least. It makes a mockery of the national sport and dedicating the birth anniversary of Dhyan Chand as the National Sports Day. If anything, Indian hockey players have been reduced to being journeymen who are required to fill up the quorum.

A major problem with Indian hockey is the battle between the administrators, who were not long ago running two parallel, but equally powerful bodies – the Indian Hockey Federation (IHF) and Hockey India (HI). In a way, the manipulators have destroyed the sport to such shoddy levels that the younger generation is not overly keen on pursuing a career in hockey. The bad blood has spilled over to the field and the boardrooms with the administrators from HI, which is now firmly in control of the sport, leaving no one in any doubt that they would ensure that their word is law. A victim of the officialdom or overhyped mandarins is that a person of the calibre of Terry Walsh had to make an inglorious exit in what was essentially the best year performance-wise. Walsh has put in his papers because he could not bear the torture of toeing the HI line that was neither workable nor in the interests of the sport. In less than a fortnight, the national women team coach Neil Hawgood, also an Australian, parted ways with Indian hockey. The fact that even he took the women team to new highs has not gone well with the HI administrators who wished to have yes-men on board and not proven performers.

A more bizarre development is that although the Union Sports Minister is keen on brokering peace between HI and Walsh, the Association boss Narinder Batra would want nothing of the sort. Apparently his ego was hurt when Walsh, one of the finest players to have graced the sport, cited bureaucratic redtapism as the reason for his premature exit.

Not only has Batra stated that there was no need for Walsh’s expertise, Batra was quite vocal while reiterating that they were already looking for a successor. This is a rather unfortunate development, which is affecting the morale of the players, who understand that 2015 is also the Olympic qualifier year. The odds are loaded heavily against India and the stakes are abnormally high. The Champions Trophy debacle is just an example of the mindset that prevails in the Indian camp.