Once Upon A Time. Review on Hockey

Once upon a time HOCKEY was the pride of Indian Sport’s & today what is it & where is it. I really feel bad looking at the state of this game today in our country. There use to be a time when the entire world was afraid to play INDIA in the first round of any tournament, coz it would be their last match of the tournament. Today countries like Spain, Argentina, Japan, and Egypt are beating us with a margin of 1:0 or may be 4:0.

I remember a game where India was playing Great Britan in some tournament and the Queen was also present to watch the match. Dhyanchand was leading the team. Even before the half time India was leading by a score of 11:0 & finally the match had to be stopped by the order of the Queen. The hockey stick of Dhyanchand was also inspected to find out if there was any glue in it or it had something in it as the ball seems to be sticking to it. We have also won the world cup & we are the only nation to have WON the Gold Medal in this game for the maximum number of times in Olympics. The last time we won a medal in Olympics in this game was in 1980 in Moscow.

There could be a number of reasons for the down fall of this game in our country which are:-

1. Lack of Infrastructure to play this game.

   
   




2. Lack of Re-cognation to the individuals in this game.

   
   




3. No motivation for playing this game.

   
   




4. No Sponsors for this game

   
   




5. No monetary benefit in this game.

   
   

Our Nation has produced Great’s like Dhyanchand, Ashok Kumar, Zafar Iqbal, MD.Shahid, Mukesh Kumar, Dhanraj Pillai, Jagbir Singh, Pargat Singh and so on the list goes on & on, but where are these players today.

When I say lack of motivation I mean there is nothing from the nation’s side to help these players after they have served the nation for so many years. I remember some years back I had in the news paper that a player’s child had to under go a surgery & he needed some funds for the same. He was still playing a tournament for the country & by far he was a star in the team. The government or the governing body or the association did not provide him with any help for the treatment of his child. He then took the retirement from the game.

If you see the average cricket player get an amount of Rs.1lac for an ODI, what does a Hockey player get for a match is 100$ per day. Is this comparison justified? We share the same position in the world ranking in both the sports, Cricketers live a lavish life & a hockey player lives in a Chawl. Why would some one want to sweat for such a small bit, but there are still people who do that coz they have that passion for the game or the country.

Today the world is playing hockey on Astroturf & we still have or major of the tournaments are conducted on Grass Turf. So how do you expect to the players to perform on the international level tournaments.

I heard that one of our recent hockey starts had said that “ He will want his child to play Hockey in this country” It was bcoz of the treatment they received from the airport authorities after they came back from a tournament & to tell you they had WON that tournament.

So you tell me why would not the standard of this game go down in our country if this is the way the GAME & its players are treated.

I guess the Association needs to take some serious steps to improve the standard of our Hockey & not indulge into small things like what the players are doing after their practice sessions. The President of the IHF (Indian Hockey Federation) needs to understand the need & step down from the post if he cannot do anything to improve the status or the standards of our National Sport.

Pros:- Get back to the Victory Stand & get our lost pride back in this Game

Cons:- Then we will vanish from the map of Hockey & We will only be telling our Grand Children that our country use to be No.1 in this Game ONCE UPON A TIME.