Mens hockey world cup 2023

[jayakris]

Okay, so we are back to square one. 3-3 draw and a 4-5 loss in the shootout

[srini]

2 shoot outs in the cross overs today.Spain didn't deserve to win from their pool performance, but they did. India deserved to lose which they did. We regressed and back to our old ways in 2000s decade. No light at the end of tunnel.

[PKBasu]

What a sad, sad day for Indian hockey. To lose to New Zealand, ranked 12 in the world, is an absolute disaster. India dominated most of the match. The first goal was brilliant, then India led 2-0 after scoring during a pc conversion (should have been 3-0 but one goal was disallowed after video referral). But India kept letting New Zealand get back into the game. By half-time, a defensive error had made the score 2-1. Although India led 3-1 with another brilliant goal, inevitably NZ were able to score 2 more, and India failed to capitalize on a phase in which NZ were down to 10 men (after one of their players got a yellow card).

I had planned to go to the SF, but what a waste it is to host the World Cup if our team is knocked out so early. Basically the draw in the second game against England sealed India's fate. We are never much good in knock-out matches, and there were going to be 4 to negotiate if we were to advance. Of course, we could have avoided one of the knock-outs by topping our pool, so the match against England was effectively a knock-out match -- and we failed in that match. Then, we were poor against Wales as well. Sadly, we will be back outside the top-8 in world hockey rankings now (I think), and all the painstaking gains of the past 4-6 years have been utterly destroyed.

[Saffron Lenin]

Garbage team....India current world ranking must be somewhere 13-15

[Saffron Lenin]

I won't be surprised if they lose in asian games and didn't qualify for olympics 2024

[jayakris]

Not that bad, Saffron. We won't miss out on the Olympics that easily. A loss now is probably good, for the selectors and others to feel some urgency that we need to make the right changes and drop some useless players (though it is another matter if they will ever do anything). Injury to a player also added to our issues, right?

[Atithee]

Garbage team....India current world ranking must be somewhere 13-15

And that’s why one should not call the realists like Srini a negative person. We’ve seen this scenario play over and over. Our indiscipline and unfailing regularity to concede goals at the end has been a bane of our hockey lives.

India keeps hockey finances alive like cricket and Odisha has pumped money now. This is why India is even relevant on the world stage anymore.

[sameerph]

The signs were all there in earlier matches that we were not playing well, also signs were there last year too that we are playing far below the level which won us an olympic medal in 2021. As Jay said, that this shock came now. We have time to regroup, make necessary changes before Paris 2024. Basically, the players have not changed much from the olympics team, so they are not doing something right which they were doing there. Maybe time to inject some fresh blood to replace some of dead wood. Hopefully, this loss will act as a need for these changes which was needed.

[Atithee]

Sameer, have you considered that the Olympics was an exception and that we are still basically the same indisciplined and basic error team compounded by bad selection that ssp has described ad infinitum? It’s the truth. Believe it or not.

[sameerph]

Sameer, have you considered that the Olympics was an exception and that we are still basically the same indisciplined and basic error team compounded by bad selection that ssp has described ad infinitum? It’s the truth. Believe it or not.

No. The performances before olympics were also pretty good and we had showed signs of being in the range of 4-6 ranked team. One cannot win an olympic medal out of the blue and it was not a fluke.

Fact is we have regressed after olympics, lack of focus as was there before olympics or some other things. But, I believe all is not lost and we can get back to at least that pre olympics and olympics level.

[srini]

Garbage team....India current world ranking must be somewhere 13-15

And that’s why one should not call the realists like Srini a negative person. We’ve seen this scenario play over and over. Our indiscipline and unfailing regularity to concede goals at the end has been a bane of our hockey lives.

India keeps hockey finances alive like cricket and Odisha has pumped money now. This is why India is even relevant on the world stage anymore.

No worries Atithee. I can see myself in Saffron if i go back in time to 2004. Now we are seasoned enough on the SI forum to be able to keep our mental health sane by lowering our expectations ahead of sport events.I think we have regressed from Olympics but not by miles. Actually India probably over achieved by medaling bronze since by Sameer's assertion also we were in the range of 4-6 during Olympics time. So a final standing of 3 should be considered over achievement! We got the best mathcups in Olympics which were winnable. The all important QF match with Britain was winnable and for a change we won it without messing up. Australia took care of Netherlands in another QF. So QF was the only mathch of consequence we won, later we lost to Belgium anyway and in the bronze medal match also i remember Germany was leading for the most part until we had three quick fire goals in the span of 6 minutes and we survived in the end.

To bring real improvement in any sport, i got to realize that getting best coaches for Junior teams helps more than getting the best for Senior teams. Junior coaching helps feeding the seior team with better replacements for the deadwood.Seniors almost always are uncoachable, would be difficult to un-learn what they learned as Juniors even if the world's greatest coach is ropedin. So i would prefer the senior coach role more as a strategist than as a coach. Harendra singh did a decent job of mentoring the junior teams and its effect showedup when they moved to the Senior team in Olympics.We lost Hardik to injury at this worldcup and couldn't replace him. We need good reserves and coach should be in a position where he would be overwhelmed with choices. Not sure who is coaching Juniors now, but that is the ALL IMPORTANT area.

More as follow up on my earlier observation that Wales influenced the results in this cup. Allowing 2 English teams (welsh is a dead language and Welsh people also speak English only i think) in 1 group is unpardonable offense by IHF. Why allow this cross over BS when they can keep things simple by allowing top 2 teams in group to QF ? That's what is being done in FIFA worldcup atleast! Due to this Cross over BS an undeserving Spain made to QF while a more deserving (Yes i feel if another match is held with Spain we would have beaten them again) India got eliminated before QF.

[Atithee]

^^Of course. We all bleed saffron. I disagree on junior hypothesis though. Never believed Indians’ junior achievements. I can explain why in a DM but my views have been clear for a long time in this forum.

[jayakris]

^^Of course. We all bleed saffron.

[rajitghosh]

I watched the full match yesterday as well as India's other matches. A few observations. Harmanpreet's lack of form especially on penalty corners is worrying. Many a time he was not able to strike the ball properly. Secondly in Hardik's absence there was no playmaker and India was leaving a lot of space in the midfield. Thirdly the usual problem of directionless passes was there. Fourthly Sreejesh is clearly past his prime. Fifthly some senseless play is still there. I think the player was Sanjiv if I am not mistaken who kept coming within 5m of high balls and conceded penalty corners. Sixthly the marking by the defence was absolutely pathetic. The opposition was getting a lot of space to pass to unmarked players and build moves. I can go on and on. Surprisingly Akshdeep and Mandeep the 2 players we have maligned so much in the past didn't do too badly. Lalit Upadhyay played really well. Jarmapreet played well in patches but at time made silly mistakes like mistraps, mispasses etc. It was basically the moments of madness that let the team down. They simply don't have the nerves to play these big matches. The bronze medal play off against Germany in the Olympics was an exception.
Anyway I believe this has set Indian hockey back by 10 years if not 20. The Asian Games later this year is critical. If India doesn't win qualifying for the next Olympics is nearly impossible. Asian competition is quite decent now with Malaysia, Korea and Japan having decent teams and Pakistan having the ability to surprise India even though they'll lose to everyone else. We need to re-build fast.

[Atithee]

^^Perhaps when money flows freely like the Odisha spigot seems to be flowing, things go south in India. When money is tight, we go even further south. Damned if you, damned if you don’t.

I am not surprised at all. Our general malaise in all sports is largely the same—indiscipline, disregard for authority, and 2-3 players are bigger than the game. It’s in our psyche and we just can’t break loose.