As if the drawbacks on many fronts like skill, fitness, reflexes or confidence were not enough, the Indian hockey team has got a feel of a new threat over the past four matches in the Hero Hockey World league (HWl) Final. And, that has only added to the three losses and a draw in the tournament.
Due to softened rules, the umpires are no more stopping the game for what could have been a foul earlier on — like stopping a player with body by coming face to face. This was evident during India’s quarter-final game against Australia where Indian forwards, especially SV Sunil’s moves were neutralized by the Aussies, who relied on their strongly-built physique to thwart any rival move into the circle.
“These things started after the 2012 Olympics when the rules were simplified. We were aware of it but we had not thought that it will be employed so regularly. We have to deal with it. We have started to work on it during our practice sessions. Our defenders are also working on a strategy to give it back. But, the problem is, when we do it, the umpire picks out a green card for us,” India’s experienced striker Sunil said after a practice session ahead of their classification match for fifth to eight place, against Olympics champions Germany.
“In that sense, this tournament comes as a very good preparatory stage for the upcoming World Cup. For tomorrow, we would like to improve further. We had played a 3-3 draw against Germany, which is a matter of confidence for the side. Against Australia, we took it easy and our man-to-man marking was not spot-on. We would like to keep those things in mind,” the 24-year-old pointed out.
Even the Indian head coach Terry Walsh had spoken about it on Wednesday after his wards lost 2-7 to the world champions Australia. “There was some rough rugby-like tackling going on but the umpire didn’t intervene. This is a new rule policy and you have to deal with it,” Walsh had said.
During Thursday’s training sessions, the Indian team had light physical drills but worked intensively on penalty corner conversions. German team, on the other hand, skipped the training to remain fresh for the game. The Markus Weise-coached side, lost the quarterfinal to Holland which suggests that they have not been at their best so far due to reasons like absence of key players, coupled with the transition from indoor game to the outdoor one, which has not been easy.
In other classification match, Argentina will play Belgium.
Tight semis
World Cup holders Australia will play the Olympics silver medalist The Netherlands in one of the most eagerly-awaited clashes in the tournament in one of the semifinals to be played on Friday. The rivalry between the world number two and world number three, always brings out the best among the players, resulting in a pulsating contest.
The Oranje had defeated the Kookaburras in their pool encounter but the semifinal will be an altogether different contest with Australia in red-hot form, hammering 13 goals in the last two matches. It will be a treat to watch the two most-modernised and tactically-superior teams without any major difference between them, in action and the one which remains calm under pressure is more likely to emerge the winner.
In the other semifinal, New Zealand take on world number four England, who are yet to taste a defeat in four matches.