No heads to roll immediately, says Gill

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Sydney: The worst of the Indian hockey nightmares have come true. India have again failed to qualify for the Olympics medal round.

India had pinned great hopes on Tuesday's match against Poland to go in their favour and, thus, reserve a berth in the semi-finals. But the hopes got dashed in the last 90 seconds of the crucial match. Now India have been relegated to the ignominy of contesting for minor positions.

Obviously, the next few weeks would be spent trying to find out the reason behind Sydney Olympics hockey debacle. Its time to take out the scalpels and do some post mortems.

"India missed lot of opportunities against Poland and, thus, have failed to qualify for the next round," Indian Hockey Federation president K P S Gill told India Abroad News Services on Wednesday.

Based on the Indian team's current form, few had anticipated that India would not be able to get the better off lowly-placed Poland. India could have still made it to the medal stage but for their poor goal average.

It was a roller-coaster like performance for the Indians as they were able to hold the strong Australians to a draw but met their nemesis in the shape of the latest Asian hockey tigers, Korea. India lost 0-2 to the Koreans andeventually shared the same number of points with them.

"It is difficult to pinpoint India's shortcomings in the tournament so I would not attribute one single reason for the failure of the Indian campaign," Mr Gill, the former Punjab police chief, said.

It would be a while before Indian Hockey Federation, who had spent a fortune on training the team in India and in Australia, are able to rebuild the tempo which had marked India's outings in the recent month.

"Our team unnecessarily panicked yesterday (against Poland) and we do not have anyone else but ourselves to blame for not qualifying for semi-finals," Manager and IHF secretary K Jothi Kumaran said.

"Everything for us went wrong and I would also blame luck for India's misfortunes as we were leading till the dying minute of the match," he said.

The Indian camp was utterly distressed by Tuesday's result against Poland. Million of sports followers in India had reportedly prayed for India's qualification to the last four stage.

If the hockey followers were praying in India then the scene here in Australia was the same with the Indian expatriate community and students in various Australian institutions backing them. But the prayers of the millions have come to a naught even as the players battle to come to the terms with the reality.

"It was a tale of lost opportunities as we unbelievably missed two golden chances and, moreover, our team failed to stick to the plan as nothing wentright for us," Mr Kumaran added.

Though the Indian Olympic hockey campaign was marked by a renewed confidence in themselves, it is expected that few heads would roll when the dust settles down.

Asked if major changes would take place in the Indian hockey setup in the coming weeks, Mr Gill said, "There is no such immediate plan on those lines and we would consider any such possibility when we return to India."

India play England on Thursday morning to remain in contention for the best of the minor positions.

India Abroad News Service