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Confusion over hockey coach shows IOA in poor light
Published on Mon, Sep 22, 2008 at 23:54, Updated on Tue, Sep 23, 2008 at 00:01 in Sports section
Tags: Hockey, Indian Olympic Association , New Delhi
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New Delhi: The roller coaster ride of Indian hockey continues with Maharaj Kishan Kaushik deciding against taking over as the coach of the men's team after Indian Women's Hockey Federation's objection.
After being named as the new coach of the men's hockey team, Kaushik, who is presently the coach of the women's team, was looking ahead to his new assignment.
But the IWHF didn’t take too kindly to Kaushik being snatched away from them and their vehement opposition sees Kaushik back in his old job as women’s hockey coach.
"I congratulate Kaushik that he is so fantastic that both the men and women teams want to take him as coach," selection committee chairman Ajitpal Singh said.
So what's the next best option? Selector and former skipper Dhanraj Pillay wants Air India coach Harendra Singh to step in but his trackrecord is far from impressive.
Assistant to Vasudevan Bhaskaran in 2006 his team finished 11th at the world Cup and fifth at the Doha Asian Games. Moreover, there have been reports of favouritism and targetting of senior players and it is something even Bhaskaran agrees to.
"The ad-hoc committee knows that the Dhanraj is close to Harendra and for example even Zafar (Zafar Iqbal)was an airlines man, Ashok (Ashok Kumar) is also an airline man. So in that case all these people should not be in the committee of selecting coaches," Bhaskaran said.
Sources in the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) say the selection committee should not have got into the process of selecting a new coach - a responsibility that lies with the adhoc committee running Indian hockey.
"Why the ad-hoc committee has to be in a hurry to do all these things? They can call on so many coaches and in fact I was the coach for so many years. We have Jagbir Singh, we have Cedric D'Souza. I think all these coaches have done a lot of things for Indian hockey. We could have had a meeting together," Bhaskaran added.
The man having the last laugh is former hockey boss KPS Gill. The IOA's attempt to run Indian hockey has gone nowhere and the cracks within the body are wide open.
Sources say a decision on a new coach will be taken once IOA chief Suresh Kalmadi returns to Delhi in two days.
(With inputs from Meenakshi Mahadevan)
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