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| March 27, 2000 | ||
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| HOCKEY Pushed to a Corner With six months to go for the Olympics, India is not even sure who its coach will be By Sundeep Misra
Such cynicism can't obscure the truth. After Cedric D'Souza's sacking post the 1996 Olympics, V. Bhaskaran became coach, then Pargat Singh, then Bhaskaran, then M.K. Kaushik, then Bhaskaran again, then Harcharan Singh and then Bhaskaran. But wait, don't laugh, it gets better. In the past few weeks, ever since India came third in the Sultan Azlan Shah tournament, they're at it again. "We have finally decided to bring in a foreign coach," said IHF Secretary K. Jothikumaran to the newspapers. Then he said: "We are still deciding on him." Which was followed by, "We will shortly tell you the name", till IHF President K.P.S. Gill added, "I think we will keep Bhaskaran and bring in a specialist foreign coach as a consultant." People wonder why Indian hockey has declined. Part of the answer is here. In six months is the Sydney Olympics, hockey's biggest tournament and India's not sure who'll be coach! To get a team to alter its tactics and function smoothly requires time. Dutch penalty corner legend Floris Bouvelander, approached by the IHF to assist in that area, says, "Six months is too short a time to train a penalty-corner specialist for a tournament as big as the Olympics." Foreign coaches, who have their eye on India, would not want to risk such a short-term assignment for the probability of failure and thus a blemished record is high. Meanwhile, there is a buzz about D'Souza's return to being team boss. But D'Souza's reasonable demand for a legal contract (no doubt specifying the period he will be coach and the fee he should be paid) plus the fact that he wishes to bring his own assistants in, has left the IHF in a quandary. In their world, coaches are not paid and can be shown the exit door any time, an amateurish world where D'Souza possibly fears to tread. None of this would have arisen if Bhaskaran was adept at his job. Players feel his tactical nous is limited. "I don't think he understands modern hockey at all. There are times in a match where substitutions are a must but he just does not change the player," says a senior player, pleading for anonymity. Replies Bhaskaran: "I don't change a player for the sake of changing players." Things hardly improved when the coach, after India missed 17 chances against Pakistan, said, "What do you want me to do? Go and score the goals for the Indian forwards?" Foreign coaches present weren't impressed. Said one: "If the team is not scoring goals, it's the coach's job to enable them to start scoring. It's his job to find the solution." But it's not just coaches, it's a lack of preparation, of vision, that hurts Indian hockey. Forget the gold, just getting to the final four takes immense planning. For instance, the Indian team didn't even think it important to buy video tapes of the matches that they dominated but still lost against Germany, Pakistan and South Korea. Canadian coach Shiaz booked the entire lot of matches on the day he arrived at Kuala Lumpur. So did Pakistan, Korea and Germany. Terry Walsh, coach of Australia (who weren't even playing), was there too with his camera crew and guess what he was filming? Pillay and Baljit Singh Dhillon's facial expressions! Why? Because he wanted his goalkeeper to see the change in expression on their faces when they shoot at goal and when they pass. M.K. Kaushik, who coached India to gold at the 1998 Asian Games (giving us a direct entry to the Olympics), says, "What Terry does is basic. What stops us from doing it?" D'Souza too admits planning is poor. "The coach should have been at Osaka (where the Olympic qualifying tournament is on) with a camera crew. It's a huge mistake and may even cost us a medal at the Olympics. We could have seen the teams, made notes and in the final camp, the players would have seen what they were going into." Gill is unmoved: "We will try out different strategies in the forthcoming camps." A perennial problem for India is also scoring goals. Or missing them to be precise. At the Azlan Shah Cup, India had eight field-goal chances against the Germans, six field-goal chances plus 11 penalty corners against Pakistan and nine field-goal chances against Korea. Yet India lost all three matches 1-2. D'Souza has an explanation: "We don't have a common national coaching policy. The player plays for the national team under one coach, then goes back to his club and plays under another coach who tells him a different strategy. In a few years, this back and forth finishes the player and he is absolutely confused in the shooting circle." But does anyone care? After the team returned from the Azlan Shah Cup with a bronze, a Sports Authority of India official was heard saying that India had done really well. His theory: Germany beat India and India beat Malaysia who beat Germany. So we must be good. No wonder we are where we are! Six months to go and we are not even certain if the best will represent India. Pillay says that some players should be brought back. "At least try them out. If the coach and doctor think they will be able to last 70 minutes, then put them into the team. Let's not assume a player is finished." One such player he suggests is playmaker Sabu Varkey. "When he plays, there are more options in the frontline," says Pillay. Adds Malaysia's coach Stephen van Huizen: "Sabu opens up space automatically. It's sad that a player of such calibre is left out." Similarly, India's best goalkeeper Ashish Ballal sits at home while Jude Menezes, at best a reserve goalkeeper, plays. Both Kaushik and D'Souza say they'd pick Ballal immediately (provided he's fit), but the ihf continues to vacillate. Explains one of India's assistant coaches: "Bhaskaran doesn't want senior players since he doesn't know how to tackle them. During the matches, he is afraid to substitute Pillay because he is a senior player." Compounding the situation is talk that all is not well between Gill and Jothikumaran, both of whom believe they are the last word in tactics, strategy and planning. Neutral observers in the IHF office say Gill wants D'Souza back while Jothikumaran doesn't. They also say Gill means well but is unable to function because of a band of officials which controls him. Says one observer: "Commitment to the game is a word they have never heard of." But commitment is a word that Indian hockey desperately needs. The Olympics waits for no man.
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Imagine
this scenario. Two senior officials of the Indian Hockey Federation (IHF)
sitting together on a sunny afternoon. One says, "I'm bored, what shall
we do?" Replies the second: "Sack the coach, that could be
fun."