Apr 4, 2011

Sandeep, Sardara not to feature in Sultan Azlan Shah

India's ace drag-flicker Sandeep Singh and current best player Sardara Singh will not play the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup next week as they have not attended the training camp that is being held in New Delhi. The duo are currently in Belgium playing in their national league.


Hockey India's General Secretary Narinder Batra said that those players will only be selected who have attended the national camp. Another reason why they won't be selected as they have not obtained NOC from Hockey India.

This piece of news means that two of the best players of the country, one of them Sardar Singh who is the only good defensive player we have will not feature in the against the best teams.

In my view the two should not removed from the team as they have not attended the training camp, Indian team needs both the players and by excluding them we are endangering the chance of retaining Sultan Azlan Shah and thus completing hat-trick of titles. I agree what the players have done is also not right (not getting NOC from the federation) but for that they should not be thrown out of the team. The federation should impose a fine on the players than removing them from the team.

The players who are attending the camp are the ones who have participated in CWG and the Asian Games, clearly we do not have replacements for these players especially Sardara Singh. With the same team from CWG of Asian Games, they will not have problem in co-ordination as they have played with them earlier also.

The teams which are participating in this year's edition are good, even Malaysia which beat India in the last meeting. It is very important for these two to play the tournament. Both Sardara Singh and Sandeep Singh went to Belgium to earn more money, which is not possible in India, so HI has no right to stop them from playing if it cannot provide them with more money and better facilities. The best way I see is to impose fine on the players instead of throwing them out of the team.

Hockey India is professional body of Indian hockey and they should act like it. This decision will hurt the team and the country more than hurting the players, and Hockey India should put nations interest first rather than looking out for their own interest.

5 comments:

  1. why ipl is seeing all over india there will no broadcast of azlanshah tornament i hate ipl i like hockey.why not dd can show azlanshah tournament.i am get bored of watching cricket its too much to handle previously espnstar used to brodscaast the tournament now one is sponsoring the hocket .cricket has enough money .i like watching hockey now if u live in india yu have to contend by only watching boring ipl.

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  2. Welcome to the club, this is the story of every Indian hockey fan. Even after writing mails to every channel, nothing has happened

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  3. ban the ipl,everything sports will be telecast......

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  4. ban the ipl, &all the oneday &test cricket.we have to fight for this sports.we have to bring our national game of hockey.

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  5. Though I totally agree with your comment, I hate cricket very much, but that will not be the solution, need plans to bring hockey up, by giving appropriate TV coverage. That will increase the interest among the fans and then we can surely promote the game I love the most

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