India, Australia meet in crunch clash of group

Sydney: Both Indian and Australian hockey teams have one nightmare that they hope will never visit them again. For India it is the recurring fear of not making the semi-finals and for the Australians it is the fear of going down in history as the best hockey team never to have won the Olympic gold.

It is with such a mental burden that the two teams will clash at the SydneyHockey Centre on Tuesday in what could possibly be the most crucial match in the league stage for Group B.

Either side opened well - India with a 3-0 win over Argentina and Australia with a 4-0 verdict over Poland. In comparison the remaining two teams in the pool, Spain and Korea drew 2-2.

It does not take a great expert to say that Argentina and Poland are probably the two weakest teams in the pool and there are sterner tests for both India and Austraia. But for India, the win came as a big relief considering they had not won the opening match at the Olympics since 1984.

In Los Angeles India beat United States 5-1, but at Seoul, they lost 0-1 to Russia and 0-3 to Germany in Barcelona, 1992 and to Argentina 0-1in 1996. A hoodoo had last been broken and jinx nixed.

If Vasudevan Baskaran and his men are aware of the burden of expectations, so do Terry Walsh, the Australian coach, and his boys. So it would not be out of place to say, it is now crunch time.

For India it is a question of staying consistent. Too many times in the past, they have fared below par against weaker team and done well against stronger ones. And they have always been slow in getting into their tempo in the tournament.

But this time, they have had their acclimatisation, been in Australia formore than four weeks before the Games and their physical fitness is probably at its best in more than a decade. And it showed in the game against Argentina.

Now the question is: Will India continue to maintain that form. "Yes," says Baskaran emphatically. His star players Dhanraj Pillay and Mukesh Kumar, both appearing in their third, and probably their final Olympics, echohis feelings.

Pillay has in fact changed his very demeanour and become a mellow man - as against usual outspoken nature - simply to concentrate on achieving his lifelong ambition of winning an Olympic medal.

Apart from the veterans, youngsters like Sameer Dad and goal-keeper Jude Menezes too have accquitted themselves well. Dad on his Olympic debut slotted two goals and at 22, he has a great future ahead of him. And Dinesh Nayak and Dilip Tirkey manned the defence well.

As for Australia, coach Terry Walsh knows he has one of the finest teams in contemporary hockey, but that has so far not fetched him or his boys the gold that matters.

In nine Olympic appearances Australia have three silver and two bronze, but they have a whole bunch of World Cups and Champions Trophies. The last time Australia lost to India in the Olympics was in 1972 when the Indians won 3-1 to take the bronze medal.

Since then in three other clashes Australia have beaten India 6-1 in Montreal in 1976, 4-2 in Los Angeles in 1984 and 1-0 at Barcelona in 1992. But for India, the morale booster should be the fact they beat the Australians at home in the four-nation tournament earlier this year.

One thing the Indians will have to be careful about is that they cannot afford the luxury of taking time to settle down. The Argentines allowed them that, but the likes of Stephen Davis and Michael Brennan will not do the same.

Jay Stacy their penalty corner specialist and skipper Michael York are both experienced - Stacy is playing his fourth Olympics - are the other men towatch out for. And Indians cannot afford to give away penalty corners like they did against Argentina.

And finally one more unique feature of Olympic hockey - no team has repeated a win since 1976 Olympics when New Zealand took an unexpected gold. Since then India (1980), Pakistan (1984), Great Britain (1988), Germany (1992) and Holland (1996) have won the gold.

India Abroad News Service