Hockey heartbreak

Published>Wed, Nov 24 10 07:08 AM

The malaise will undoubtedly be traced back to some significant pointer in history where all went wrong with Indian hockey. The very obvious one is India's 5-2 loss to Malaysia in the Azlan Shah championship six months and 11 days ago, which was rendered to footnotes after the tournament was won.

India should have known better than to take the Malaysians lightly in their Asian Games semifinal on Tuesday. For in a space of 75 minutes their dreams had altered from clinching a London berth as winners to the peace-sapping nightmare of facing the Koreans for the crumbs called the hockey bronze medal.

Watching arch-rivals Pakistan gun for their eighth Asiad gold medal might not be too much fun either.

But the precise recorded moments of India's doom were the three that stabbed at the heart of all Indian hopes: India's missed short-corner conversion through Mahadik, with Sandeep Singh off the field with injury that could have changed the scene to 4-2, Malaysia's equalizer through Amin Rahim in the 69th minute that made it 3-3, and his 75th minute conversion that inflicted sudden death on the Indians.

"We grabbed our chances when the short-corners came to us, today India couldn't hold onto their own opportunities. But these are the same players and coaches who gave you the win against Pakistan. As a coach I know how fortunes can change in minutes. It doesn't make India a bad team, or their coach a bad coach," said Malaysian coach Tai Beng Hai, though manager Harendra Singh has already sent in his resignation, and India's Spanish coach Jose Brasa said he didn't expect India to renew his contract further.

It was a long, forlorn walk for the Spanish coach along the aisles of the stadium as the lights went dim after India's exit, and the sprinklers came on and he stood lingeringly next to the stand where the hockey sticks are hung picking and sipping from a half-finished bottle of water.

It hadn't seemed so disastrous when Sandeep Singh had leveled scores 1-1 just before the whistle to neutralize Tengku's strike for Malaysia three minutes earlier. Then Tushar Khandekar had deflected a cross from Shivendra Singh to go 2-1 up in the 36th minute and skipper Raj Pal Singh jumped into the melee to put India ahead again with quarter-hour to go after Misron Azlan converted once more to keep the Malaysians abreast.

'Cornered' out

But at the other end, the unfancied team were earning corners prolifically and converting them with equal gusto, while their goalkeeper Kumar Subramiam denied the Indians twice in penalty corners, and his defender dived the next time to clear a ball that slipped past him, even as India's wretched luck with the short corners returned like Tolkein's Gollum against the young, and fast-paced Malaysians.

"We couldn't score the 4th goal in the second half and missed the penalty. The Malaysian goalkeeper played really well after the break, and we should have worked a little more on some moves from the right flank rather than rushing it," Brasa rued. The real foresighted surprise would be if the Spaniard was retained and not let to leave after one poor showing here, though he shared no such optimism.

"I don't think they'll offer me to continue. But yes the job for India to qualify for London gets more difficult," he said. Malaysian captain Madzli Ikmar Mohd Noor stressed that the Malaysians had aimed at minismising India's chances and capitalizing on the few of their own, and with nothing to lose from the big game, they'd ensured that all their hard-work on set-pieces had borne fruit here.

"Their conversion rate today was 3 out of 4, which is good to win a hockey match," Indian captain Raj Pal Singh said, unable to explain his own team's poor count on that front on Tuesday, when just four days ago, he'd been gushing about his own flicker Sandeep Singh.

But then Pakistan were squarely beaten on that day, and are now invoking Beijing 1990 ? the last time they won the Asiad gold ? after showing Korea the door 4-3 on penalties, and the wheel of fortune had turned.

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