The Champions Trophy was instituted as an elite tournament for the world’s top hockey-playing nations in 1978, and within four years India had a medal to boast of.
It had, however, not made it to a title-clash, until Thursday night when a draw between host Great Britain and Belgium cleared India’s path to its maiden final, against World champion Australia.
With every team in preparatory mode 50 days before the Rio Olympics, the Champions Trophy, this time around, has been more of a fine-tuning event instead of an all-out competitive tournament. Understandably there is cynicism and applause in equal measure for India’s achievement in London.
Merwyn Fernandes, part of the team in the 1982 edition, preferred to look at the positives. “I applaud the boys for what they have done, and it will be a big morale booster ahead of the Olympics. Let’s not run down the performance by claiming the other teams were not full strength. Even we were without four or five main players,” Fernandes said.
“To be among medals on the back of several juniors is not easy.”
At London, coach Roelant Oltmans rested Sardar Singh, defender Rupinder Pal Singh and striker Ramandeep Singh while Birendra Lakra was out due to injury. In their absence, the younger lot has done well to stand up and be counted.
“The best outcome of resting the big guns is that they will now know no one is indispensable. That makes every player give more than 100 per cent to keep his place,” Fernandes said.
Former India coach Rajinder Singh, who scored a hat-trick against Pakistan to win that bronze in 1982, said goalkeeper P.R. Sreejesh was the key to India’s fortunes while the four-quarter match format had also helped. “It has helped do away with the fatigue in last 5-10 minutes,” he said.
India has always done exceedingly well in the run-up to the Olympics while the other teams focus on the big picture. Peaking early has mostly backfired as India tends to lose out when the Games come around.
India’s performances at the Champions Trophy in London have wavered between sublime and surreal. Easy goals were conceded but some were scored too from acute angles.
Notably, it braved the crowd pressure and a bitterly hostile host team to win a critical contest.
The midfield was a concern, and it was virtually invisible in a couple of games with the players oscillating between attack and defence.
In a throwback to old times, India’s penalty-corner conversion was the lowest in the competition.
With most teams, including India, focussed on experimentation, the discerning followers agree that it would be premature to predict what lies in store at Rio.
The performance does, however, reiterate that the team is on the right track. Two medals at the world-level events in six months paints an encouraging picture.
While the rested players are set to join the team at the six-nation tournament in Valencia immediately after this, strong teams like New Zealand, the Netherlands and Argentina would also be present there, giving India a much better idea of both the opposition and its own strengths.
The results:
Australia 4 (Mitton 20, Zalewski 23, Ogilvie 35, White 45) bt India 2 (Raghunath 45, Mandeep 49).
Germany 7 (Staib 12 & 60, Grambusch 27, Deecke 29 & 35, Herzbruch 32, Miltkau 58) bt Korea 0.
Belgium 3 (Briels 1, Luypaert 30 & 42) drew with Great Britain 3 (Middleton 25 & 59, Ames 57).
