Many moons later, as I sit back to ruminate on a century of South Asian sport and the sight of the lit border springs from the subconscious, the heart longs to dwell on the romantic but the persuasive mind over-rides that. For, there is so much to celebrate, so much to lament. So much joy and so much despair. South Asian sport has given us so much ecstasy and so much agony that the romance can wait.

And we can thank the British for that. Truth to tell, Britain’s influence was always evident on sport in its colonies in South Asia. Sports like cricket and hockey, football and tennis and a host of others had not only been introduced to the region by priests, defence personnel, educationists et al in the nineteenth century but also sustained by them through the first half of the twentieth century. For whatever it is worth, the British are worthy of the South Asians’ gratitude for introducing sport.

To be sure, the subcontinent found its soul on the maidans, to the innocent sound of bat against ball, stick against ball, boot against leather spheres, to the roar of a young country that was learning that sport – and sport alone – could forge that chain every link of which spells ‘Nation’. Indeed, sport was welding the country into a whole, cementing the communities together, compelling crowds to think in terms of country, breaking down barriers, nourishing the ideal of a nation.

Of course, it is a matter of regret that the British did not leave the economy of either India or Pakistan in a shape in which sport would be a priority. The state of their economies do not afford any of the South Asian nations the chance to focus their energies on sport but, in the past few years, corporate sponsorship has come in handy to keep them going. Sport may never be a priority but it has always generated much passion, with cricket even acquiring the overtones of a religion.

The cricketers of the subcontinent have been alternately revered and hated, adored and abhorred. They have been raised to the status of demi-gods, as whole peoples bid to bask in the reflected glory of their cricketers. Despite being a rather recent inductee to cricket, Sri Lanka has not been an exception to this phenomenon of reflected aspirations.

Talk of Sri Lanka reminds me that no discourse on South Asian sport will be complete if its recent surge in cricket and track and field is not taken note of. Inspired by the wily Ranatunga, the Sri Lankan cricketers won the World Cup in 1996, pulling the rug from under Australia’s feet at Lahore’s Gaddafi Stadium. The next year, sprinter Susanthika Jayasinghe became the first South Asian medalist at the World Athletics Championship by claiming the second place in 200m.

For all that, when you sit back in your favourite armchair and freeze-frames from a sporting century lash your mind like waves hitting a beach, it is possible that South Asia’s domination of Olympic hockey – India and Pakistan account for as many as 11 gold medals – and the decline of their powers in the sport that was rapidly changing to suit Europeans will occupy pride of place.

While the hockey team was on cloud nine, an indefatigable wrestler called Gama – Ghulam Husain- also did the subcontinent proud by being Rustam-e-Zaman, “champion of the world”. The cricketers, drawn from different regions, were still learning to cope with the demands of Test cricket, learning to play as one. It is for this reason alone that the story of south Asia’s monopoly of Olympic hockey competition will be written in letters of gold, at least as far as the first three-quarters of this century goes. In fact, the decline of oriental hockey in the last two decades comes as a stark contrast.

Yet, when India, its team comprising many Anglo-Indians and Muslims besides the 22-year-old army captain Dhyan Chand, scored 29 goals without reply in winning the gold medal in the 1928 Olympic Games in Amsterdam, interest in the game spread rapidly. Yet, legend has it that when the time came to raise money to send the side to the 1932 Games in Los Angeles and a journalist asked Mahatma Gandhi to issue an appeal to the masses, Gandhi’s reply was: “Hockey? What’s hockey?” The outfit did make it to the Games, duly won the gold again, and paid for its journey back home by playing some exhibition matches in Europe.

In what has been branded the Nazi Olympics at Berlin in 1936, India completed the hat-trick of hockey gold medals. Germany battled hard and conceded but one goal in the first-half but a barefoot Dhyan Chand scored six goals in the 8-1 victory. It was to be the last time that players from Lahore and Sialkot, Quetta and Karachi played for India in the Olympic Games. The trauma of partition was to hurt Indian sport.

When the Olympic Games were staged next in 1948, Pakistan was a separate nation and it finished a creditable fourth. India won the gold for the fifth time in Helsinki four years later when Pakistan retained its fourth place finish. After losing the final to India by RS Gentle goal in the 1956 Games in Melbourne, Pakistan climbed the winner’s podium at Rome in 1960, riding on the strength of a Nasir Ahmed strike in the 12th minute. India regained gold at Tokyo in 1964 and in the boycott-ridden Moscow Games in 1980 while Pakistan was to win again in Mexico City in 1968 and Los Angeles in 1984, when it avenged a loss to West Germany in the 1972 Munich Games.

To be sure, long before Susanthika Jayasinghe surfaced, South Asia had a clutch of good, even world class track and field stars like quartermilers Milkha Singh and Abdul Khalique, hurdler Gurbachan Singh Randhawa and steeplechaser Mubarak Shah, hammer thrower Mohammed Iqbal and the incomparable PT Usha but there is a sneaky feeling that athletics would have flourished if the British influence had lasted a little longer. Indeed, one of independence’s biggest victims was athletics.

It was as evident as in cricket. The long wait before India and Pakistan teams realized the importance of playing together as units amply reflects the fragile nature of the sides. It needed imaginative, selfless leadership by men like the Nawab of Pataudi Jr, Mansur Ali Khan and Imran Khan for the two sides to actualize their potential, despite the odd good result.

Partition was a grim reality. It was hard then for sports fans to get used to mental barriers that had not existed. It was no longer possible for them to think of cricketers Vijay Hazare and Fazal Mahmood turning out in the same colours. Lala Amarnath and Abdul Hafeez Kardar. Bishan Singh Bedi and Zaheer Abbas. Sunil Gavaskar and Imran Khan. Mohinder Amarnath and Wasim Akram. Sachin Tendulkar and Saqlain Mushtaq.

Of course, Mohammed Azharuddin had the unique privilege of leading a joint Indo-Pak team in an exhibition game against Sri Lanka at the start of the World Cup in 1996 when Australia and the West Indies preferred to concede walk-overs to the home side than travel to the tear-drop island. But it was a notable exception and, rather sadly, and India-Pakistan cricket derby provokes more passion than anything else. Ask Wasim Akram and his 1996 World Cup team-mates. Ask Bedi or Gavaskar.

If in the wake of partition, Pakistan has boasted of gifted hockey players like Hassan Sardar and Akhtar Rasool, Salim Sherwani and Mohammed Samiullah, Shahbaz Ahmed, India had its own Mohammed Shahid and Ajit Pal Singh, Ashok Kumar and Surjit Singh, Dhanraj Pillay and Balbir Singh.

Pakistan has also been the object of envy for being the home to a quiverful of world squash champions like Jehangir Khan and Jansher Khan while an Indian badminton maestro answering to the call of Prakash Padukone conquered the world, even if he seemed almost apologetic in doing so.

The subcontinent boasts of a string of world billiards champions like Wilson Jones, Michael Ferreira and Geet Sethi and a world amateur snooker champion, the late Om Agrawal. Of course, one of the best chess players the world has ever known, Viswanathan Anand, is an Indian too while Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi ended 1999 as the world tennis’ best doubles pair.

On the administrative front, if India gave the subcontinent the quadrennial Asian Games, Pakistan conceived the Champions Trophy hockey. Come to think of it, the world’s most powerful amateur boxing official Anwar Choudhury could have helped more pugilists from the subcontinent to win international acclaim than he managed.

For all that, the presence of such sporting stars, not to speak of cricketing greats like Gavaskar and Zaheer Abbas, Kapil Dev and Imran Khan, Arjuna Ranatunga and Aravinda de Silva – to name just a few and risk inviting the wrath of many – has helped the South Asians rid of their inferiority complex. Today, the browns clash against the whites but the code is clear – on equal terms.

Sadly, in the final decade of the century, betting and bribery scandals have broken out in the subcontinent and rocked world cricket like little else has. More importantly, they have forced fans to view cricket from behind tinted glasses – or with squint vision, if you please. And that is the tragedy of modern sport that is increasingly being driven by the commerce of television.

It is this reason alone that will prevent India and Pakistan from coming together on the cricket field like the West Indies as a regional outfit – an amalgam of nations that are bound together mainly by cricket. The Berlin wall may have come down and united the Germans as one but one of modern cricket’s endearing passions will not come to an end.

For starters, consider this dream team that could have been playing in the new millennium had it not been for that dotted line that we got to see during the flight to Lahore: Saeed Anwar, S Ramesh, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, Inzamam-ul-Haq, Sourav Ganguly, Moin Khan, Wasim Akram, Anil Kumble, Javagal Srinath and Saqlain Mushtaq. Awesome, isn’t it? Is it not good enough to take on all-comers? Under any conditions?

Then again, India and Pakistan are so vast and boast of such wonderful talent that their cricket officials may never think it necessary to bring the teams together as one. And, this notwithstanding the fact that they have teamed up to organize the World Cup twice. If you are inclined to brand me an incurable romantic, I cannot blame you, can I? Indeed, I was among those on the chartered trip to Lahore who were on a flight of fantasy as well.

* This essay was first published in Pakistan daily newspaper, Dawn, on January 1, 2000.

India’s elite wrestlers have been pleading for an air-conditioned training hall at the Ch Devi Lal Northern Centre of the Sports Authority of India in Sonepat. All international competition is held in air-conditioned venues and it is not an unfair demand that has to be met. Similarly, the Rugby Sevens squad, which made it to the semifinals of the invitation event in Delhi last month, has been seeking a hike in diet allowance.

Rowing Federation of India President CP Singhdeo told me on Tuesday that Indian probables – and these include Asian champions – for the Asian Games to be held in Guangzhou in November are waiting for boats to arrive from overseas and are continuing to train in Hyderabad in boats that were imported seven years ago for the National Games. The case of the cyclists is worse: they are training with machines that were imported nine years ago.

Two factors bind each of these little big tales. First, all these athletes are hungry to do well and be among the medals at the Commonwealth Games and/or Asian Games this year. It is this spirit that we recognise and salute. The other thing that is common to these athletes – besides table tennis players, gymnasts and full bore shooters – is the inadequate support by the Sports Authority of India to India’s best sportspersons.

It is precisely this reason that forces our shooters to buy their ammunition from the National Rifle Association of India at a higher price than it imports. It led to the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence slapping a fine of Rs 8 crore on NRAI for selling arms, ammunition and targets, imported without customs duty, to its state units and shooters for profits. The moot question is: Why is the Sports Authority of India not giving the shooters all this?

For a long time now, I have been wondering why our shooters have to buy ammunition and targets from NRAI? The simple reason is: Because the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports (and its baby, Sports Authority of India) has failed to provide the shooters the required ammunition or even make them available at a subsidised price. It claims that it has liberalised import procedures, giving shooters import duty exemption on a maximum of 25,000 cartridges (costing Rs 17 each) but should it not be providing the cartridges to the shooters in the first place?

If it can ensure that the hockey team has got adequate hockey balls to train with, the track and field athletes have the right amount of equipment to train with, I can never understand why the shooters have to buy their own ammunition. I can understand then having to buy their own weapons but not the reusables. It is like telling national swimming campers to arrange for their own water to fill the swimming pool.

I believe it is imperative that the Sports Authority of India – and its parent, the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports — has to get its act right if India is to make an impression in the two most events in the calendar this year: the Commonwealth Games in Delhi and the Asian Games in Guangzhou. Its focus on training the elite athletes must be razor sharp and it must not allow any slippages to ensure that India’s best can be ready for the big competition without a hassle.

Of course, we could turn around and ask why the respective National Sports Federations are not providing their elite athletes the facilities and the equipment to prepare for the Commonwealth Games and the Asian Games. The answer is not far to seek: the federations do not have the wherewithal since the monies provided for the training of the elite athletes by the Union Budget are routed from the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports through the Sports Authority of India.

Until the Federations start raising their own funds to support the cream of their own sport, we will keep hearing such soul-stirring tales of our champions running from pillar to post to ensure that they have the right training conditions as they prepare to take on the best in the Commonwealth and in the continent. And that is what makes the Indian sportsperson’s pursuit of excellence such a daunting but beautiful task.

Balbir Singh Sr. was manager of the Indian team that won the 1975 World Cup in Kuala Lumpur after which Aslam Sher Khan, who scored the equaliser against Malaysia in the 1975 World Cup in and Ashok Kumar, who scored the solitary goal in India’s victory over Pakistan in the final, became heroes.

Even as India’s standing in world hockey hit a downward spiral in the modern times, the magical, if sometimes mercurial, Dhanraj Pillay emerged a huge star. It did not seem to matter to the fans that Dhanraj Pillay did not matching silverware in his trophy cabinet, except the 1998 Asian Games gold. The fact that he instilled fear in the opposition ranks was enough for the fans.

Full back Dilip Tirkey took over as the biggest Indian player but now, when India’s fan base does not seem to have eroded despite it still being on a treadmill as far as its presence in world hockey is concerned, it does not have a single player with claims of being an icon, a hero. Not one player seems to have the charisma to stand out in a crowd.

Of course, you can argue that it is good in some ways as no player must be larger than the singular unit that his team can be. But the fact is that nearly all sport in India is personality driven and every sport needs its heroes to make an impact in the collective mindset of the sports loving people of this wonderful nation.

So, how can an Indian hockey player – or players, if you please – be built up as a sporting icon?

I am convinced Team India needs to play more often – and win even more often than it does now – at home so that its players can be seen on TV if they are to ever become icons. It was heartening to see news TV channels speak with the Indian players after each game. If such interactions get more frequent, it can only be good for the evolution of their image.

Of course, one of the basic criteria for a player to be built as a star is for him to perform incredibly well – and over a sustained period of time. And on the basis of what we saw in the FIH World Cup where India played six matches, there are not too many who have it in them to wear the mantle of the super star and draw crowds.

I wish Shivendra Singh had not sat out of two crucial matches after starring in India’s 4-1 victory over Pakistan. He must be the one player closest to being a big draw, with his speedy runs and his poaching skills in the rival circle. Full back Sandeep Singh was the other player but he disappointed with both his defending skills and his inability to convert penalty corners.

I guess we will have to wait for a while before we have a super star emerging from the ranks of the Indian team and until that happens, India hockey will have to settle for being in the penumbra of the sporting firmament behind Indian cricket, English Premier League and other European leagues, Formula One, world golf and the professional tennis tours.

Oh! For another Dhyan Chand or Balbir Singh Sr or Aslam Sher Khan or Ashok Kumar or Dhanraj Pillay. Oh! For another Pargat Singh or Dilip Tirkey.

This piece was written for www.stick2hockey.com

The Indian team at the start of one of its FIH World Cup matches

One of the spin-offs in a career in which writing and commenting on cricket seems to have taken precedence – despite having been to Olympic Games, Asian Games, SAF Games and numerous other non cricket sporting events – is that I have not been in touch with a whole generation of Indian hockey players.

A quirk of fate offered me a chance to make some headway in that direction when I got to spend some quality time with some players last week. In fact, I got to chat up with a couple of them from the Indian squad that took the field in the Hero Honda FIH World Cup on a 15-minute drive and we were able to exchange notes on a number of contemporary issues facing Indian hockey.

One of the pet peeves of the contemporary player is that their predecessors keep insisting that they do not work as hard as they did in their time. “I believe that if we had played in their era, we could have played three matches in a day. Such was the pace at which hockey was played then,” one of the players told me.

Now, that may be debatable but the players – like the modern cricketers who believe that past players are making a living by commenting on their performances – do have a point about some of the former stars being a little uncharitable towards the present squad. For I have always believed that former players have a responsibility towards the sport that they played so passionately and follow with similar intensity now.

If I tended to agree with the spirit of that statement I was in disagreement with what came next – and it had to do with payments. “We don’t get compensated for the amount of work we put in at training,” the player said, pointing out that unlike in the past when National camps were not year-long affairs.

“Players could spend time with their families and turn out for their respective employers’ teams in the domestic circuit. Now, we do not spend much time at home and find it hard to play for our employers,” he said. I pointed out that money was not the reason they had picked up the hockey stick the first time and said I believed their recent strike was unjustified.

“You talked of dues when you were not contracted to get any amounts from your Federation,” I said. “I am not against you making money but I disagreed with your method. If you were seeking player contracts and graded payments, you should have got into negotiations with the Federation and convinced them like the cricketers did a few years ago.”

To their credit, both players did not show any signs of animosity and heard me out when I explained how the then captain Sourav Ganguly, Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Anil Kumble and Javagal Srinath spent close to two years convincing officials of the Board of Control for Cricket in India that graded payments needed to be introduced.

“I agree that we started playing because we were passionate about it and did not expect to be rewarded for pursuing our passion,” he says. “But having coming along and having proved ourselves to be the best in the land, is it unfair to expect to be compensated? And, don’t you think many youngsters would be drawn to the game if we make it lucrative enough?”

Of course, I said. And since we had arrived at our destination, it was time to drop them with promises to stay in touch and share notes and ideas.

This piece was written for www.stick2hockey.com

It would be an understatement to say that India dominated much of the match – throwing in a number of attackers to raid the South African circle, playing a bit more aggressively than it did in the past few games. And yet, for a large part of the second half, it did not seem to find that one nudge that would slot the ball home – until just five minutes were left for the final whistle.

The irony was showcased tellingly when India earned its second penalty corner in the first half. For the second time running, Arjun Halappa was unable to stop the ball for Sandeep Singh to try and drag-flick it. But, he recovered to be able to pass the ball to an unmarked Diwakar Ram whose powerful drive went in off goalkeeper Erasmus Pieterse’s pads to earn India a 2-1 lead.

We had a greater dose of such a paradox when India scored a fabulous goal when Sarvanjit Singh capped a delightful bout of passing but that had to be disallowed since South Africa had asked for a video referral and secured a penalty corner. The irony was greater because India’s coach Jose Brasa had said a couple of days ago that umpires must not stop play for referrals.

And it became more stark when the video referral paid dividends for South Africa and it was awarded a penalty corner. Lloyd Madsen made no mistake with converting that and pushing his team 3-2 ahead 13 minutes into the second half. The crowd could not believe that India’s goal had been reversed and South Africa given the chance to take the lead.

It was the quarter-hour spell after that which reinforced the cruel irony. India virtually pitched camp in the South African half and did everything but score. The ball was deflected in to the goal twice but on both occasions, the only sticks it connected in the scoring circle were South African and the wild cheer from the home fans were only false alarms.

I was a bit surprised that with the forwards not finding the scoring touch, Brasa did not try the unusual but not unique tactic of making a defender play inside the rival circle to try and deflect the ball in to the goal. Time after time, Rajpal Singh, Prabhjot Singh and Gurwinder Singh Chandi did not make contact with the crosses and yet no innovation was tried.

For quite some time, the threat of having to finish fifth in the group behind South Africa and play-off for the ninth place were looming large. And then, the stadium heaved a collective sigh of relief before bursting out in applause when Shivendra Singh pounced on a rebound off Pieterse’s pads and reverse flicked it in to salvage a draw.

Indeed, the irony was never more apparent.

This piece was written for www.stick2hockey.com

Had India drawn, if not won its match against England in the Hero Honda FIH World Cup at the Maj. Dhyan Chand National Stadium on Saturday night, it would have kept its slim hopes of making it to the last four alive. But a 3-2 defeat at the hands of the European champion left it with only mathematical chances of getting there.

I believe where England scored over India was its players’ greater control over fundamentals of passing and trapping besides working as a unit. Simple stated, it meant that more often than not, when an England player passed the ball, he would find a team-mate running to be at the right place to receive the ball.

Inda made a deliberate attempt to slow down the pace of the game – and therefore control the flow in the first half. There was a method to breaking into the striking circle with long passes but there was not much talent on show inside the scoring area. Each time a striker could not get a clear view of the goal, he would end up losing the ball to the England defence.

And when that discipline was forgotten and almost rustic scrimmages became the order of the day early in the second half, England was able to wrest control with an assured defence that sparked swift counterattacks that led to a couple of goals by Ashley Jackson – one off a penalty corner and the other to end a melee.

Yet, in the fightback that India launched after being 0-3 down, we could see glimpses of the future. Sardara Singh, Bharat Chikara, Dhananjay Mahadik, Gurbaj Singh, Shivendra Singh, Gurwinder Singh Chandi and Sandeep Singh showed that they could be shaped into a good unit in the coming years. There are young men who are ready to play their hearts out.

Sardara Singh and Gurbaj Singh played their roles adequately enough and can be the mainstays for some time to come while Dhananjay Mahadik and Bharat Chikara guarded the left flank with zeal. And though Sandeep Singh’s skills in defence can always be improved, his presence becomes important because he is India’s best drag-flicker.

There are many who do not think that Gurwinder Singh Chandi is ready to don the striker’s mantle yet but the lad showed that he has a good ball sense and the knack of figuring in the frame at crucial moments. He just needs to increase the frequency of such appearances and make his presence felt as a scorer in the manner in which he tapped in India’s first goal on Saturday.

Each of these lads just needs to focus on sharpening his own game – and enhance his ability to work with the others in the squad – rather than worry about anything else. If they need to secure player contracts, they can always have some former players handle that rather than get their feet themselves as Deepak Thakur and Prabhjot Singh did a few weeks before the World Cup.

If all those who care for hockey – and believe me you, this is not a small number – can lend their shoulders to the wheel, it will move in the right direction. We have seen a groundswell of support for Indian hockey, despite the team’s successive losses to Australia, Spain and England after that heady start against Pakistan. We have some talented players, too.

Believe me, it won’t be long before we figure in the top four bracket again.

This piece was written for www.stick2hockey.com

Indeed, it was a poignant sight that will be etched in my mind for a long time. India had lost its second successive match by a 2-5 margin and yet many hundreds of its disappointed fans lingered on to cheer the team. The warm gesture after India was outplayed by Spain on Thursday night showed that the sport will find support in the country.

The stadium was packed well before India’s key contest with Spain was due to start and it was quite an experience again, hearing the crowd sing the National Anthem as one and with pride. But its throaty support to the home side was not good enough to lift the side to be competitive until it was too late.

Clearly, there were not just 15 Spaniards working overtime to stop India’s dream of finding a winning sequence. The home team took the ground with enormous baggage – for 35 years and eight editions, their predecessors had tried and fallen short of the semifinal at the FIH World Cup – and this side was expected to alter the course of Indian hockey’s destiny in one tournament.

This was the match that could pitchfork India among the contestants for the semifinal berth; this was the game that would set it up for a battle with the vastly improved England; It was not going to be easy, especially since Spain has always been a tough opposition and since it has been a while since India has played opposition such as Australia and Spain in the span of 48 hours.

The pressure was simply too enormous. Shivendra Singh’s enforced absence due to a two-match ban left the team without sting. Besides, hard as the young Gurwinder Singh Chandi tried to show that he belonged in this league, India’s lack of strike power upfront came through clearly. It was not long before the domino effect was felt at the other end.

India’s most consistent Indian players – Dhanjay Mahadik and Bharat Chikara – made uncharacteristic mistakes in defence and left the team staring down the barrel of the gun at the end of the first half.  The two goals that the side conceded were both defensive lapses that let Albert Sala and Pol Amat score unhindered.

It was always going to be difficult for India to play catch up, even after Sandeep Singh scored four minutes into the second half. Spain answered the challenge with two goals in as many minutes and it was all over bar the shouting. Sandeep Singh scored a second time to spark some hope but Spain was in control and pumped in a fifth goal towards the end to seal victory.

For a squad that boasted of three drag-flickers, India’s penalty corner conversion rate – scoring just once from the six chances – left it bruised. Sandeep Singh found the target once and caused the crowd to find its collective voice one more time but he will be the first to admit that the Spanish goalkeeper Francisco Cortes was more than equal to the task of denying him.

It is not as if there were no positives; there were some. The Indian side mounted a steady fightback in the second half and kept pressing for goals – even if it came up against resolute defence. The team was able to keep fighting till the end, something that we have not known many Indian hockey sides to do.

Yet, in the end there was disappointment for the vast majority of the 15,000 hopeful fans who packed the wonderful stadium and many trooped toward the exit gate when Spain scored its fifth goal with three minutes left. Yet, the sight of a few hundreds staying back to cheer the Indian team was heartwarming. There is hope yet for Indian hockey.

This piece was written for www.stick2hockey.com

If collective will of the goodly crowd could have resulted in a few goals, India would have won by a handsome margin but in the end, the match was a testimony to the famed Australian traits of grit and resilience as well as its players’ ability to actualise their coach’s plans. A 5-2 verdict in favour of the Australians seemed a fair result for the efforts that the teams showcased.

Even if the world acknowledges England as the most improved side in the past couple of years, Australia was not expected to lose its opening game against that team. Its goal-scoring skills seemed to have deserted the team from Down Under in that match but on Tuesday, it found the target often enough to peg India back.

Early on, India did not have the kind of speed that the Koreans showed in their game against Germany on Monday. That mean the counterattacks from the penalty corners lacked the bite needed to be effective against the superbly fit Australians. The short passing that the Indians tried was also of no avail as the Australian midfield and defence tackled remarkably well.

India was, of course, hamstrung by the fact that it could have only four players on the bench after spearhead Shivendra Singh’s suspension for two matches. Coach Jose Brasa’s worst fears came true and when he sought fresh pairs of legs to send in, he did not have many options. And his players also came up short when having to find ways past the seemingly impregnable defence.

This was not a night on which you could fault the Indians too much. For, you could see a great sense of purpose and method in Australia’s marauding approach to the match. They simply did not let the Indians play their game and kept scoring at frequent intervals to ensure that they would pick up full points from this contest.

Even the staunchest of Indian supporters – and there were celebrities and diehards, Olympic legends and school kids in the stands – will concede that it was Australia’s redemption night. It was a bit of a shame that India had to come off an emotionally and physically draining victory over Pakistan and run into a squad that was hurt by having lost to England.

This piece was written for www.stick2hockey.com

Set to coincide with Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith’s visit to the Indian Capital, the decision to institute a trophy to honour two legends – Ajitpal Singh and Ric Charlesworth – this decision is reminiscent of the ping pong diplomacy route that the United States and China took to achieve a thaw in their relationship back in the 70s.

There have always been calls round the world to keep politics away from sports but world leaders — statesmen and politicians alike – have found it a convenient platform to further diplomatic moves through sport. It is hard not to recall some such instances, not the least being Pakistan President Gen. Zia-ul-Haq’s trip to Jaipur for a cricket Test match in 1987.

Then in 1996 when Australia and the West Indies withdrew from their World Cup cricket matches in Sri Lanka, India and Pakistan got together to field a joint side in a friendly game against the home side to show the world that it was safe to travel to the tear-drop island in Indian Ocean.

I remember watching the telecast of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2003 match between India and Pakistan in Centurion Park and the attempt by the two captains, Sourav Ganguly and Waqar Younis, to remind their fans that this was but a game of cricket and not to see it as proxy war as has become the norm.

Back in 2004, India’s Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee told the cricket team before it left for Pakistan that it was important not only to win at the sport but also to win hearts in Pakistan. The camaraderie that existed on that tour is firmly embedded on the minds of all those privileged to be on that tour, with 8000 Indian fans sitting alongside their Pakistani counterparts.

There is no doubt that sport has the power to facilitate healing of fractured societies. And Australia has taken the initiative to institute a trophy to honour two legends, one the captain of the Indian team that won the World Cup hockey in 1975 and an Australian who was a member of the 1986 side that won the World Cup and has been a successful coach too.

Charlesworth, who is here as Australia coach, saw his team being at the receiving end during its game against England – not just because it lost 2-3 but also because the crowd, steadily building up for India’s match against Pakistan that followed, was lined up against it.  Clearly, the fans were making a gentle statement about the attacks against a number of Indians in Australia.

This piece was written for www.stick2hockey.com

The spectators went back with memories of a beautiful experience

As soon as he heard from his friends that tickets were available for the evening’s hockey games, Dr. Anil Bhat convinced his wife Dr. Sujatha Bhat and their daughter Aakanksha to give up the idea of watching a movie in favour of turning up at the National Stadium to watch the big contest. Fortunately for him, he did not have to deal with any hesitation.

I got to speak with Dr. Anil Bhat at breakfast on Holi and was pleasantly surprised to hear that the security did not stifle the spectators’ enthusiasm. “On the contrary, the levels of security were the same as I would expect at international airports – X-ray machines, metal detectors and frisking – and nothing that can be termed excessive,” he said. “We spotted Olympic silver medallist Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore and actor Gul Panag in the same stand as us. And I am sure they came through the same process as all of us and had no complaints.”

He was only echoing what the grand old man of Indian hockey, triple Olympic gold medal winner Balbir Singh Sr.  said about the levels of security. “Keeping in mind the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore, the arrangements made by the organisers for the Hero Honda FIH Word Cup are appropriate. I believe the security of the players is of paramount importance in itself and to the image of our country,” he said.

To revert to my conversation with Dr. Bhat, a full 12 hours and more after he left the National Stadium with his family and friends, he was radiating a joy that only Indian sporting conquests have the ability to place on thousands of faces in one go – and on the faces of the lakhs of fans who tune in to radio commentary or watch the live telecast.

Dr Sujatha Bhat, who was a first timer at a sporting event of this magnitude, did not lose time in becoming the part of the massive crowd. “We were disappointed that we had not carried the Indian flags with us but soon discovered that we could have our faces painted with the colours of our National flag for just Rs 25,” she said.

The Bhats’ daughter, Aakanksha pointed out that there was no better feeling than standing in a stadium and singing the National Anthem along with thousands of fellow Indians and cheering their favourite team to victory. “It was truly an experience of a lifetime,” she wrote on her Facebook page.

“There was plenty of food and beverage available and we could even carry our coffee cups to the galleries,” Dr. Anil Bhat said. “What’s more, the toilets were clean and a far cry from what we expect at our sports facilities. If anything, we would have liked to see huge board that listed the names of players on the field.”

Clearly, the Indian team has given the sport’s administrators another chance to raise the profile of hockey in the collective consciousness of the nation. The win on Sunday night and the beautiful feeling spilling over to the celebrations of Holi showed that fans love it when they get the chance to cheer a spirited Indian team.

The squad needs to deliver positive results consistently in such high profile events for it to remain in the public eye. The challenge before the sport’s administrators is to ensure that they schedule the calendar for the team that it plays often enough.

This piece was written for www.stick2hockey.com