Gill says no quickfix, selectors wash their hands of the team

As the blame game began after the Indian hockey team failed to qualify for the Beijing Games, three of the five members of the IHF selection committee...

As the blame game began after the Indian hockey team failed to qualify for the Beijing Games, three of the five members of the IHF selection committee washed their hands of the team that was picked for the qualifiers in Santiago.

Olympians Harmeek Singh, Surinder Singh Sodhi and Gurbux Singh today said they had transferred all responsibility to coach Joaquim Carvalho and the IHF since their voices weren’t being heard anyway.

“National coach Joaquim Carvalho and the management (read IHF) were given a free hand to spot players of their choice. The IHF selection committee

had no role to play in it,” Harmeek Singh told The Indian Express from Chandigarh.

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He said the selectors wanted drag flicker Sandeep Singh and Arjun Halappa included in the squad. But Carvalho rejected the proposal outright “for reasons best know to him”.

Both Sandeep and Arjun had given a good account in the Premier Hockey League “which was why we wanted them to represent the country in these qualifiers.”

After that confrontation, the selectors said they had stopped interfering. That was the crux of a letter they dashed off to the IHF president and the coach.

“At a crucial juncture, the chief coach refused to pay attention to selection committee members. So we decided to sit out on the bench. Right from spotting of the players to training, the selection committee didn’t have a say. The coach was told to pick the team,” said Surinder Singh Sodhi from Jalandhar.

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In Kolkata, Gurbux Singh said the team was selected in Australia itself where they were playing in the run-up to the Olympic qualifiers. The selection committee is headed by IHF president KPS Gill himself. Olympian BP Govinda is other member of the committee. So is the selection committee just a dummy? “Ask this question to the federation, not me” was Harmeek Singh’s reply.