Discipline the key; Pakistan have it and India don’t

They played to a plan, combined brilliantly, and the coordination between players was exemplary. But despite all the coaching and the disciplining, the one move that stood out was their last goal, which no coach can teach.

Kashif’s goal in the 68th minute was raw talent, as he fooled two defenders and went past goalkeeper Devesh Chauhan to slot home from a zero degree angle, almost from the goalline. If the Pakistanis can keep this up, if they can improve more and develop more with time, they will come back with a medal from Athens.

As for the Indians, a medal seems too far away to even think. If the team doesn’t show any inclination to improve, I think Athens 2004 will also be, like often in the recent past, just participation for the Indian hockey team.

We got two goals all right, but take your mind back and you’ll see that both were goals scored from melees. Gagan Ajit, Baljit Dhillon and Arjun Halappa combined well at times, but none of their moves were constructive.

This is easily understood from the statistic that neither of the goals were scored from moves they built. Stray balls in the D were slotted in, not something the Indians can expect in every match they play. In fact, though the score was 2-2 for the longest time and it seemed like the two teams were going neck-and-neck, it wasn’t so. Pakistan was always the dominating side.

But one improvement I saw in Saturday’s game is how the Indian defence managed to handle the high balls. The defence played really well, and Dilip Tirkey stood out with two brilliant stops, without which we would definitely have lost by a bigger margin. The defence and the halfline continued to receive balls to their left, a mistake even school teams don’t commit anymore these days.

The biggest problem with this Indian team is refusal to accept their drawbacks. Unless they do so, and put up a checklist of areas of concern, and work on them, they can’t expect to do well. Penalty corners in either D remain a huge cause for concern. We don’t have a good PC converting specialist and nor do we have the wherewithal to stop oppositions’ PC attempts.

Our defence, midfield and forwardline still seem to be playing in three different teams and continue to play with zero coordination or communication. We still seem to run miles with the ball instead of playing the ball ahead and making it run more than the players do. We don’t have a creative enough centre half who can plan the whole game and play the pivotal role. And we don’t have a good enough back-up for Devesh in case he has an off-day or is injured. And we continue to move from the left flank instead of the more useful right.

The Indians should be happy with what they have achieved here, simply because they ddn’t deserve more and because their primary aim in Madrid was to qualify for Athens.

A lot of the players have fantastic skill, but that’s not good enough in modern hockey. To their ability must be added planning, strategy, coordination and discipline.