The Indian men’s hockey team is in the quarters of the Paris Olympics after playing three matches, drawing one and winning two. The opening match for Harmanpreet & Co. was a tough one vs New Zealand, where India just edged past 3-2, Argentina came up with a surprisingly spirited effort to draw 1-1, while against Ireland, it was a one-sided encounter 2-0, for India.
From the outset, all looks great for India for now, where they look set to win another medal after Tokyo 2020 bronze, but if one looks at all three matches closely, there are a few issues that might just hit the team hard and might be a detrimental factor in a medal coming/or maybe not.
Unpopular opinion, yes, but the Indian team management, Craig Fulton and Harmanpreet really need to get back to the drawing board, to address a few issues and long impending issues.
Lack of Field Goals by Forward Line
Can you believe this. Till now, in three matches, India has only one field goal that came from the stick of Vivek Sagar Prasad in the first match of the Olympics 2024 campaign. After that, it has only been Penalty Strokes, and Penalty Corners that have fetches India the goals. What is the forward line of Sukhjeet, Abhishek, Gurjant, Mandeep and Lalit Upadhayay doing? Agreed, modern hockey has much more penalty corner goals, but field goals also need to come, somehow.
Poor Penalty Corner Conversion Rate by Harmanpreet Singh
Once again, ardent hockey fans might not agree, but Harmanpreet Singh, being the sole decent penalty corner specialist, has been over-burdened with duties. He is the only one who steps up when in need. And that is affecting his performance as well. Yes, Mandeep scored vs NZ, but that was on a ricochet from a Harman PC. Now, that means, against NZ India just converted one out of the 6 PCs earned.
Coming to the match vs Argentina, Harman converted only 1 from 10 India got. In the match vs Ireland, we got eight PCs, and once, only one goal was scored. So, that says a lot.
Conceding Tons of Penalty Corners
The issues don’t end there. The defending in the box hasn’t been good either. We have managed to leak them, rather. The main rusher Amit Rohidas has been a wall, and so has PR Sreejesh, the keeper, but India haven’t been able to keep the legs out of the way, in the box. Against NZ we gave away 10 PCs, out of which two were converted. In Argentina match, India gave 5 PCs, but luckily, no goal came from there. Lastly, vs Ireland, we gave 10 PCs.
Germany, Netherlands or Great Britain Won’t Spare You
| Team | Goals For | Goals Against | Goals Difference |
| Netherlands | 11 | 5 | +6 |
| Germany | 13 | 5 | +8 |
| Great Britain | 8 | 4 | +4 |
Notwithstanding where India finish in the group, the could be up against Germany, Netherland or Great Britain in the quarters. All these teams are heavy scorers, and quite miserly when it comes to giving goals. So, India really need to mend their way, or a medal might not come.
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