With the Indian men’s hockey team winning bronze at Tokyo Olympics, it hasn’t only made them the side that everyone wants to beat. It has also made the Graham Reid-coached side fearless and at times invincible and they will look to put on another similar performance when they take on England in a double-header in FIH Pro League over the weekend at Kalinga Stadium in Bhubaneswar.
The team naturally doesn’t always begin every game in similar fashion and do fail to hit their top form from the very word go. They let in goals and fail to breach the opponents’ defences. Despite that, when they trail or are just a goal away from victory, the team fights on relentlessly. And on more than one occasion recently they have found the decisive goal at the very end.
It happened during their Pro League matches against Argentina last month when Mandeep Singh sounded the board in the last minute of both the matches. While they won the second one 4-3, they lost the first via shootouts after the match ended 2-2 in regulation time.
It also happened in the first match against Spain in February when Harmanpreet Singh scored from a penalty stroke with just seconds remaining to help India with 5-4.
This has certainly left many in awe of the team’s fighting spirits. Harmanpreet, however, believes it’s all about sticking to the basics.
“It’s something that we always remind ourselves that even if we are a goal down, we shouldn’t forget our basics. We know our roles and responsibilities and we stick to our structure. Finally, we give our best till the very last minute,” said the vice-captain during a virtual press conference on Friday.
“Also, when someone is making mistakes the players around him start motivating him and that’s very important. And after playing poorly, when we do finally score it boosts our confidence and then it seems that we can make a comeback.”
While the wins have been nerve-wracking, it has also helped the Indian team rise in the Pro League table and they are currently just a point behind leaders Germany, who have 17 points from eight matches. A win on Saturday will thus see them grab the top spot.
As for England, the team is seventh on the standings and have six points from four matches. They began the tournament by beating Spain in both the matches but then went down to Argentina in successive encounters. While the team lacks experience, captain Tom Sorsby is quite hopeful of putting on a good show against the hosts.
“We showed what we can do against Spain, and even against Argentina we put together some great parts of that game, which weren’t all bad, so just taking the positives that we have from Argentina, with the wins from Spain and will try to put that against India in these two games,” said Sorsby.
Meanwhile, India will once again be led by Amit Rohidas, for whom the experience of captaining the side has been great so far.
