How and why did things change for the worse for Indian hockey? Who was responsible for it?
Answers
Answer:
India were slow to take to the astroturfs, with local players still mostly playing on natural grass fields, which meant that the Indian hockey teams fell short at global events.
Answer:
There are number of reasons Indian hockey was knocked out off the perch and its Indian hockey community who has to take the blame for its downfall. Here are some of them:
Defeat in 1982 Asian Games: Everyone wants to be associated with a winner and no one likes a loser. Television started entering Indian homes in 1970s and 7–1 defeat in the finals of Asian games that too against Pakistan in your own lost India many hockey fans. Also, Indian cricket team winning 1983 World Cup helped them gain many fans from hockey. Sports fans from India saw Indian hockey team lose to their arch-rivals Pakistan and then Indian cricket team beating mighty West Indies to win the world cup, so naturally the fans were more inclined towards cricket and good consistent performance diverted hockey fans and younger generation to cricket.
and did not play enough games. While rest of the world were focussed on leagues to improve their players, Indian players only trained in the camps and went out to play matches. Belgium hockey team in 2011 were at 13th position in FIH rankings while India was on 12. in 2015, India was at 7th place while Belgium was World No. 2 because of simple reason of playing in international leagues. Their players regularly play in EHL (toughest hockey league in the world) apart from their own national league while Indian hockey players only play in HIL for a month and no foreign exposure.
Limited hockey pockets in country: Give Indians map to Indian people and ask them to mark the place where you find hockey players. The place which will have most of the markings is Punjab. India has very limited pockets of hockey (Punjab, Haryana, Karnataka and Odisha) and not many players come from other parts of India. There is immense talent in the country but the talent is not tapped properly. Investing in scouting systems will surely help Indian hockey which is currently running out of options
Though the situation today has changed a lot, medal winning performance in 2014 Asian Games, Hockey World League and Hockey Champions Trophy has brought fans back in the game, the number of astro-turf has also increased from 42 in 2007 to 137 in 2016. Also the current generation of players have gelled well with each other. Players having fun before Olympics, watch it here
Hockey in India is improving consistently and by 2020 Olympics we will surely be medal contenders