Indian Hockey-Dead and Buried

The inevitable has happened ,today is the gloomiest day in Indian sporting history.After all,this was on the cards for a long time now.It is only a matter of time that our national sport becomes an endangered game.India is now out of the Beijing Olympics for the first time in 80 years ever since it first played in Olympic.We have only ourselves to blame to let our national sport down...


Let us take this blow right into our chests and accept defeat with grace and responsibility that we failed to preserve one of our long standing traditions and did not do our duty of honouring the greats of the game.We allowed cricket to take the centre stage giving in to marketing giants who saw business in cricket and promoted it.We wanted our sons to become a Suni Gavaskar rather than a Baskaran.We began to see hockey as a sport of the past and crcket as our country's pride.The 1983 cricket world cup triump changed cricket into an industry and Hockey into a game played by strangers.

We started giving more importance to cricket in schools,colleges and each of the Indian cricket team's triumph was rewarded more than it deserved andeach victory was hyped as if we had won a world war each time.The Hockey governing body also failed to promote hockey during its vital stages nor did it take steps to find raw talent in the interior parts of the country.A Dhanraj pillai was diminished for no reason,a famous Asia cup win was not shown the attension it deserved.A chak de India was a hit,but it never made a new Indian Hockey fan,a PHL was born -the best attempt was made to make it famous but only in vain-Alas everything is in our heart,our reluctance to accept Hockey as our primary sport and show the respect it truely deserves...
The Path Ahead...?
* This has happened for the good,atleast we now know where our Hockey really stands among the other nations
*The Indian Hockey Federation should accept its inability to improve the standards of our Hockey and the Top officials should be shown the door.
*Good,Effective sports administrators around the world should be invited to revive the game and do what has to be done
*We ,the people must learn to respect players of other sports and allow ourselves to think that Cricket is not a greater game than any other sport in the world.
*We must realize Cricketers are not heros(Only the men who fight for us in the borders really are),and understand it is all business going out there to win our attension....

Let us hope for the best and beleive that our Hockey team, backed by our resolve in promoting the game, can do well in the future....