"Playing a World Cup at home will be a memorable occasion for the players. We have prepared well and are looking forward to taking on the world's best," team's coach Gregg Clarke said.
"We will go step by step. The immediate target is to do well against Holland. I have learnt a lot of things playing with the senior team and will try to apply those things," skipper Manpreet said.
The tournament schedule is set with four pools of four teams of which two from each pool will advance to the quarterfinals. India are placed in Pool C with the Netherlands, S Korea and Canada. Pool A will feature Germany, Pakistan, Belgium and Egypt. Australia, Spain, Argentina and France are competing in Pool B while England, New Zealand, South Africa and Malaysia will clash in Pool D. All the matches will be telecast live on Ten Sports, Hockey India said adding that the tickets for the event can be purchased from www.ticketgenie .in.
India, who won a silver in 1997 World Cup and followed it up with their only gold medal in the event in 2001, failed to repeat the feat in subsequent events. In 2005 they were fourth and in 2009 they finished a lowly ninth.
Squad:
Goalkeepers: Sushant Tirkey, Harjot Singh; Defenders: Gurjinder Singh, Amit Rohidas, Surender Kumar, Sukhmanjit Singh, Pardeep Mor, Kothajit Singh; Midfielders: Manpreet Singh (captain), Satbir Singh, Harjit Singh, Imran Khan, Prabhdeep Singh; Forwards: Malak Singh, Mandeep Singh, Talwinder Singh, Akashdeep Singh, Ramandeep Singh; Standbys: Jagdeep Dayal (goalkeeper), Lalit Upadhyay and Gurmail Singh (midfielder), Affan Yousuf (forward).
The Times of India
