After the World Cup preparatory tour to The Hague, The Netherlands, Indian team’s national camp is currently underway in the Capital. Head coach Terry Walsh spoke to the media after team’s practice session on Thursday. Excerpts
How do you sum up the European teamsIJ According to your standard, has it gone up in the developmental level despite the lossesIJ
I don’t really worry about the score lines and games that don’t really matter. I think we have improved a lot. We were quite a threat to the Europeans style of hockey, there’s no doubt that we can play them with much more confidence. We have some elements in our game which really threatened their defensive structure.
So, European tour was very constructive, a lot of positives, there’s hardly any negative thing that came out of the European tour. It would be much easier for us when we step into their environment.
What are the areas you are focusing on after the European tourIJ
There will be a big physiological change in the sharpness, so there’s a whole lot of strength programming which has been done which will change in the power. That will convert into much more sharpness on the ball. Sharpness, tactical work, little bit of foot movement and goal scoring all of these things will come from that. We are looking how we tackle the ball in the mid field better. We are looking at fast reactions from our players.
The team is still conceding late goals.
Answer is by getting better.
Did you manage to achieve the targetsIJ
We moved a long way towards effective and positive outcome pretty much all the objectives that we put in place. There was lot of objectives which were almost hidden, hidden learning which goes on. Players were doing some simple things. It would have a huge effect on what we do
How much of time will it take to cover all the basesIJ
There’s a lot of ground for this team to cover at the international scene, but we would not be able to cover much more before we head to the World Cup. It’s a long process, it’s taken us six months to build the level that we needed at the physical point, until we were able to get to that level, we can’t do much else. Unfortunately, international hockey requires that as a basis. Guys are working really hard.
What is your opinion on the results of the matches the team played in the tourIJ
You don’t play for results when you are preparing and trying to bring some changes.