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Whither, Magic Wand?

This team's our best ever in terms of talent, but what it needs is brains to bring home the gold <a href=pti_coverage.asp?gid=24 target=_blank> Updates</a>

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Whither, Magic Wand?
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When Pride Still Mattered
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Inventive Middle: Midfielders like Vikram Pillay will soak up pressure and feed the forwards creatively.

India's coaches and managers must appreciate why India hasn't won since the 1975 World Cup and the boycott-affected 1980 Olympiad. It's time Indian hockey tore itself away from past glories and recognised how much other teams have improved. Ironically, because the European teams lacked skill, they worked much harder in developing the strategy, tactics and thinking that make all the difference in today's game.

Rick Charlesworth, legendary coach and the man who led Australia to its 1986 World Cup win, feels it may be a gap too wide. "There is no doubt about the talent but I seriously doubt whether your coaches can be a step ahead. It's difficult to see them thinking, planning and rewriting strategy."

Few will question the talent on display. In Athens much will depend on the forward line and the creativity that the midfield can unfold. Forwards Gagan Ajit Singh, Deepak Thakur and Prabhjot Singh can score if the right moves flow from the midfield. In any top team it is the midfield that creates those incisive passes that result in moves in the striking circle.

In Ignace Tirkey, Bimal Lakra, Vikram Pillay and Viren Rasquinha we have halves of quality.But as Terry Walsh, former Australian captain and now Dutch coach, said after the Olympic qualifying tournament in Madrid, "The Indians have a creative midfield; the only thing they lack is the intensity to increase the performance level."

That's important, because when the Dutch and Aussie midfielders crank up the pressure in the pool matches, the Indians will need to take them on, not back-pedal. Charlesworth believes that Vikram Pillay should play central midfielder: "He is the bull, he can create space and he is the only one who can increase pace when on the run with the ball."

The last time the midfield played like a dream was in the final of the 2003 Asia Cup in Kuala Lumpur. Locked 2-2 with five minutes left, Ignace Tirkey picked up a loose ball in the Indian half and ploughed his way up, easing past three scrambling Pakistan midfielders. Then, in a moment of hockey magic, he had the vision to see a gap in the goal to the keeper's left, and struck the ball with precision into that gap.

Indian midfielders and forwards have to look out for those opportunities. "In an Olympic match, you get five to six goal-scoring chances and a top team would use at least four of those," says Pakistan's Dutch coach Roelant Oltmans.

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Defence Doubts:Though Dilip Tirkey is one of the world’s finest backs, the rest of the defence may prove our Achilles Heel.

In defence we have Dilip Tirkey, rated one of the world's best defenders by a host of international coaches. But it's still our weakest link as a team and Tirkey's frustration is apparent when he says, "It's a job where you have to be alert every second. There are times when defenders feel the team doesn't fall back in time to help. With five forwards swarming all over you, you do need six players at the back."

Even Rajinder is worried about the defence, especially as defensive errors can lead to penalty corners—where we lag behind Argentina, Australia and Holland (whom we face in the pool matches) in conversion rate. Argentina has the amazing Jorge Lombi to convert while Holland has Taeke Taekema and Bram Lomans to fire in. Each training day, Australia practices around 500 penalty corners, all indirect variations. Meanwhile, the Indians treat penalty corners as cool-down sessions. As Walsh and Charlesworth point out, there is a need to boost intensity.

That intensity can also come from total belief in the coach, but it would be difficult to find a single Indian player who honestly believes in their coach, past or present. Privately, they will talk about the difference in the strategy, mindset and the success enjoyed by an Oltmans, Hendriks or Charlesworth.

The individual players certainly have the talent, with each player willing to work up that extra sweat, stretch that invisible muscle and, as Dhanraj Pillay says, "There is this intense desire to unfurl the tricolour."

Perhaps in Arizona, where the Indian team trains under Oliver Kurtz, who won gold at the 1992 Barcelona Games with Germany, the team and its coach will see the path that elevates them from underperformance to the podium. After all, for a billion-plus nation and for a 16-member team, Pride Does Matter.

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