Hockey in countries besides India

A forum to discuss Indian hockey and the disarray it is in despite the promising new professional PHL series.

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Hockey in countries besides India

Post by BSharma »

I made this thread to discus hockey in countries other than India.

Jay and some other SI members have expressed their views about the Chinese men's hockey team and how the Chinese team will become a force to reckon with in a few years. The Chinese have hired former Korean hockey coach Kim Sang Ryul to guide them through the 2008 Olympics and beyond. Kim Sang Ryul is a no-nonsense coach who resigned as coach of the Korean women's team after the 2004 OLympics because he found the Korean girls hard to handle and more interested in coloring the hairs or painting the finger nails or go shopping. Ryul took over the Korean men's team in 1989 after Korea finished 10th at the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul. His team won the 1994 Asian Games after beating India and Pakistan and later won the silver medal in 2000 Olympics.

http://www.fihockey.org/
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Hockey in countries besides India

Post by gbelday »

Thanks Doc, it is an interesting thread!
I think the Chinese are going to be force to reckon with. It's doom time for Indian hockey :( I have no faith in the people who run Indian Hockey. It is going to be a struggle to win a medal at next Asiad. I see Korea, China, Pakistan and even Malaysia finishing ahead of India (at the asiad level). Qualifying for the Olympics is a big dream as I see it!
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Hockey in countries besides India

Post by BSharma »

What have the Aussies been doing to prepare for the Hockey World Cup in September 2006?

Barry Dancer, Australian men's hockey team coach, said that his team started preparing for the World Cup in May 2005. The Azlan Shah and Champions Trophy Tournaments will be used for selection of the team and final preparation. Timing is the key for the coaches to get the Australian players to reach their peak performance at the World Cup and some national team players are being rested. Jamie Dwyer, Stephen Mowlam, Bevan George, Dean Butler and Michael McCann will be held back so the coaches can evaluate some promising players at the Azlan Shah Cup from 18 to 25 June. The Australians will try to defend their Champions Trophy title in Terrassa, Spain from 22 to 30 July, and go all out to win the World Cup in Monchengladbach, Germany from 6 to 17 September.

An National Development Squad was also named to give international exposure to future Australian senior team players. The Development Squad will travel to Malaysia and Korea to play 8 to 10 matches against the national teams of those countries.

2006 National Squad
Michael Boyce (WA), Travis Brooks (VIC), Dean Butler (QLD), Liam De Young (QLD), Luke Doerner (VIC), Jamie Dwyer (QLD), Nathan Eglington (QLD), Troy Elder (QLD), Russell Ford (VIC), Bevan George (WA), David Guest (TAS), Rob Hammond (QLD), Aaron Hopkins (WA), Mark Knowles (QLD), Stephen Lambert (QLD), Brent Livermore (NSW), Michael McCann (NSW), Daniel McPherson (NSW), Stephen Mowlam (VIC), Matt Naylor (NSW), Eddie Ockenden (TAS), Grant Schubert (SA), Matthew Wells (TAS)

2006 Azlan Shah Squad
Michael Boyce (WA), Travis Brooks (VIC), Liam De Young (QLD), Luke Doerner (VIC), Nathan Eglington (QLD), Troy Elder (QLD), David Guest (TAS), Rob Hammond (QLD), Aaron Hopkins (WA), Mark Knowles (QLD), Stephen Lambert (QLD), Brent Livermore (NSW), Russell Ford (VIC), Daniel McPherson (NSW), Matt Naylor (NSW), Eddie Ockenden (TAS), Grant Schubert (SA), Matthew Wells (TAS)

National Development Squad
Des Abbott (NT), Geoff Boyce (WA), Keil Brown (QLD), Nathan Burgers (ACT), Chris Cirello (VIC), Tom Cleghorn (SA), Ben Creese (TAS), Josh Hawes (ACT), Daniel Hotchkis (ACT), Fergus Kavanagh (WA), Eli Matheson (NSW), Greg Reece (TAS), Ian Smyth (VIC), Glen Turner (ACT), Jason Vuletich (WA).
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Hockey in countries besides India

Post by ssp »

An interesting article about the decline of Pakistan's fortunes:


----------------------------------
PAK Time for PHF chief, secretary to quit

By Rehan Siddiqui

Pakistan, once the proud holder of all major trophies including the World Cup and Olympics and envy of all hockey playing nations, has plunged to the lowest of lows in rankings, barely managing to qualify for the World Cup to be played later this year after finishing a disappointing fourth in China and the latest debacle in the Azlan Shah Cup, heaped further humiliation.

A country which has automatically qualified for all previous World Cups due to its high ranking and the only nation to have lifted the coveted trophy for an unprecedented four times struggled against minnows Ireland, Belgium and South Africa which clearly suggests things are not moving in the right direction. The latest defeat in Kuala Lumpur against Argentina was another body blow to Pakistan’s hockey prestige.

It was 1994 when Pakistan last won a major title the — World Cup — in Australia. From then on it has been downhill all the way with results getting from bad to worse with no improvement in sight.

The reasons behind this disgraceful fall for a team that was once the invincible Asian powerhouse are multiple, but the major one being that the game’s ruling body Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) has been managed by incompetent and non-professionals.

When appointment of top officials to run sports are based on whim and fancy by Islamabad then one should not be surprised by the results achieved. The same has been in the case of PHF.

Unfortunately, both the top slots of PHF for the past five years have been in the hands of non-professionals who hardly had any knowledge of hockey. Naturally the game suffered in every aspect, including results at the international level.

First came General Mohammad Aziz, who at the time of taking over as president of PHF, was a serving general and had many more pressing engagements to tackle. So the game suffered as his hand-picked secretary, Brig Musarratullah Khan, was defacto chief and seemed to be more interested in foreign tours than in the betterment of the game.

After General Aziz stepped down another non-hockey personality, Syed Tariq Kirmani, was picked to revive the ever-declining fortunes of the sport. It was another wrong choice as the latter himself admitted that he has never picked up a hockey stick in his life.

Instead of getting rid of the old management and rope in men having knowledge of the game and a clean reputation the newly appointed PHF chief retained Musarratullah. The outcome was obvious as Pakistan’s fortunes continued to nosedive.

Every time the team puts up dismal performance the PHF officials shamelessly declare that the next major event is their objective.

This has been the slogan of the present management. Not surprising the same slogan has again been floated by the PHF president and by now a more powerful coach-manager Asif Bajwa. This is nothing but a cruel joke.

The PHF chief declared the other day that Pakistan’s target was Olympics while Bajwa insists his goal was this year’s World Cup.

Besides being relegated virtually to also-rans in world rankings, Pakistan have also received negative publicity as bad losers and with worst disciplinary record during the last five years. Even PHF officials were alleged to have been involved in human smuggling.

Pakistan hockey has suffered immensely and to avoid further humiliation it is time for the Sports Ministry and Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) to get rid of present PHF president and secretary and replace them with competent and honest people with a hockey background.

Unless such drastic action is taken Pakistan hockey’s fate will be no different than that of squash.

------------------------------

Shame to see Pakistan following in our footsteps, albeit 20 years after we messed things up.
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Hockey in countries besides India

Post by jayakris »

ssp - Thanks for the article.

But a reminder on our rules for the forum -- please give the URL for the article. In general quoting full articles are a no-no, though it is somewhat OK if the URL is given (especially when the URL may not be permanent). It is an absolute no-no if the article is in a subscription site or will go into a paid subscription archive after a free period ... etc etc.

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Hockey in countries besides India

Post by ssp »

Jay
Point taken.
Tried the link to the website but didn't work.
Will avoid doing this in future.
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Re: Hockey in countries besides India

Post by ssp »

Incredible defeat for Pakistan today. They lost 9-2 to Holland!! What a sad day for Asian hockey. Pakistan are slowly sinking to our level.

Holland, Germany, Australia & Spain look much better than the rest of the teams & on current form they are the likely semi-finalists at the World Cup.
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Re: Hockey in countries besides India

Post by jayakris »

I don't think we are THAT bad ssp.  I can guarantee that we will NOT lose to Holland 2-9 right now.

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Re: Hockey in countries besides India

Post by PKBasu »

I think we showed quite decisively in Kuala Lumpur (at the Azlan Shah Cup) that we are now quite definitely the best team in Asia, especially with that 3-0 defeat of Korea. Unfortunately, we have simply not been within more than whispering distance of beating Australia, Germany or Holland in more than a decade (and now, in the past few years, Spain).
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Re: Hockey in countries besides India

Post by BSharma »

The FIH website has posted some informative information about hockey teams that will play in the World Cup (men and women).  Check it out at Korea, Argentina and New Zealand
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Post by jaydeep »

Yesterday in another extrodinary match host Spain defeated Austraila 5-3 ... But what surprising is, after first 20 minutes Aussies were leading 3-0 ... Superb comeback by Spain to defeat Mighty Aussies.

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Pakistani players find themselves in hot waters after their worst ever defeat in Champions Trophy against Netherlands ...  Jang newspaper accused that a wild beach party enjoyed by the "indiscipline" (senior players) players on the eve of the match would be one of the reason of thrashing by Holland ... Also criticizing the attitude of goalkeeper, Salman Akbar, was embarrassing and unsporting when he threw his gloves in the wash basin and then kicked the door of the locker room after he was replaced in the first half.

Pak's hockey debacle linked to wild party - PTI Report for DNA

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Last edited by jaydeep on Thu Jul 27, 2006 12:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Hockey in countries besides India

Post by gbelday »

Thanks Jaydeep!  However, I don't see the point.  I am not sure why our media is so focussed on reporting the decline of hockey in Pakistan.  I wish they spend their *valuable* time and energy on writing something constructive for the betterment of Indian hockey (or other sports in general).
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Re: Hockey in countries besides India

Post by BSharma »

I agree with Gautam completely.  Instead of focussing on Indian hockey and trying to raise the standard to become the best in the world, we like to compare our hockey with Paksitan and are delighted when the Pakstani team drops to our level or below us.  :damn:
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Re: Hockey in countries besides India

Post by david »

The report carried by DNA is an agency report generated from Karachi. So it is a Pakistani reporter who did the article and DNA just carried it.

Indian journalists share good relations with Pakistani journos and the team members. Esp after the PHL exchanges.

So it just a story of news value and it was carried by many hockey freaks in the Sports Desk at Mumbai for DNA.
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