THE National Under-16 team lost both their friendlies and height contest to the visiting under-17 Chandigarh hockey academy from Punjab, but the team showed some promise in their fighting display.
The juniors lost 6-1 and then 1-0, and will wrap-up the series today.
The Malaysian boys not only lost on the pitch, but also in height. The Punjab boys were all six-footers, while the Malaysian players hardly reached their shoulders.
“The first match went badly because the boys were overawed by their opponents physique, and also because boys from Bandar Penawar and Bukit Jalil Sports Schools were combined to play in a match for the first time.
“But in the second match, there was marked progress and they could have even won the match is not for the three bungled penalty corners,” said national under-16 coach K. Dharmaraj.
The boys are being groomed for the 2013 Junior World Cup, and Dharmaraj said he will increase the pool to make it more challenging.
“I will slowly increase the pool, so that there will be continuous challenging among the payers for positions in the team.
“This will make them realise that there is no guarantee, and they will have to constantly be at their best to be in the training pool.”
The current national senior team has a limited pool of players, and many have taken their spots for granted, as they know that even if their performance drops, there are no capable replacements to rip their national colours away.
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Saturday, January 24, 2009
Gaining attention in Chula Vista
Tiffany Snow a member of the U.S. women's field hockey team and a San Pasqual High graduate watches as her teammates play No. 1-ranked Netherlands Wednesday at the Olympic Training Center in Chula Vista. (Photo by Jamie Scott Lytle - Staff photographer)CHULA VISTA ---- In a national sports landscape dominated by football, baseball and basketball, the U.S. women's field hockey team is gaining attention the only way it knows how: by putting up a fight.
"We persist," defender Rachel Dawson said. "It's not always easy, and we don't necessarily get the acclaim. But we put in the sacrifice because we're building this team to be something more."
The United States has long struggled in field hockey, having failed to qualify for three of four
Olympics until it reached the
2008 games in Beijing.
But by placing eighth in Beijing, the U.S. made such an impression that the top-ranked team in the world has come to Chula Vista this week to train with and scrimmage the Americans.
The five-game series against the 2008 Olympic champion Netherlands, which continues through Monday at the U.S. Olympic Training Center, represents a significant change in the international field hockey community's perception of the Americans.
"Just having the Olympic gold medalists wanting to come and play scrimmages against us is a pretty good indication that we're gaining respect in the world and they're interested in seeing what we're doing," U.S. coach Lee Bodimeade said.
Last July, the U.S. team won its first Olympic qualifier since 1988 with a win over Belgium in Kazan, Russia. The Americans haven't won an Olympic medal since taking bronze at the 1984 games in Los Angeles.
"To compete against this caliber of team, its pretty rewarding to see their skills and try to emulate that," said San Pasqual High graduate Tiffany Snow, one of two North County high school products on the U.S. roster for this week's session. "We're striving to be at that level so for them to come out and play against us is a great opportunity and kind of a sign of respect."
Torrey Pines grad Jessica Javelet, a member of the national team's developmental squad, is also competing for the U.S. this week.
The Americans have made the majority of their progress since Bodimeade became their head coach in 2005. A member of Australia's men's national team from 1991 to 1998, Bodimeade quickly earned the players' respect and was named USA Field Hockey's national coach of the year in 2006.
"I respect and admire him so much," said Dawson, the 2007 college player of the year at North Carolina. "We all know that he was a great player for Australia, but I think his ability to connect with us and invest in us has paid off."
The Americans have lost each of the first three scrimmages to the Netherlands by a combined score of 18-0. The fourth scrimmage is scheduled for Sunday at 1 p.m., with the finale set for Monday at 3 p.m. All scrimmages are free and open to the public.
Despite the lopsided scores, the U.S. has clearly progressed the past four years.
"When I took over, the team had been unsuccessful in qualifying for the 2004 Olympic Games," Bodimeade said. "Through that came a lot of fallout with players who thought their dreams of playing in the Olympics were over and changes in the coaching structure took place. It was really a feeling of where do we go from here."
Bodimeade said one of his key aims as head coach was to establish a personality for the team.
"What we've defined, first and foremost, is what style of hockey the USA plays," he said. "Our philosophy is to attack, that's the driving attitude of this team. Once we established that mentality, we were able to come up with a four-year plan that got us to Beijing."
The week of scrimmages against the Netherlands is just another step toward his attempt to bring the USA back to the top of the field hockey world. In February, the team will head to the Bahamas to compete in the Pan Am Cup.
"What better way to prepare for the Pan Am than playing against the No. 1 team?" he said. "I think right now we're the envy of the field hockey community, getting to play against such high quality competition."
Dawson said she hopes the momentum that's starting to build behind the U.S. team translates into new field hockey fans.
"This is the time to buy in," Dawson said. "We're definitely going places and this is a great spectator sport. We hope to inspire young kids to play and get them involved because we really are only going up from here."
Friday, January 23, 2009
Looking for a real challenge? Try field hockey
By Nicolas Lewis
Rocket Assistant Sports Editor
When I first started writing for The Rocket at the beginning of this school year, I was afforded the opportunity to take my choice of which sport I would like to cover on a regular basis.
I chose to cover field hockey, and I did so for two reasons.
I was eager to tackle the challenge of writing about a sport I knew next to nothing about, but also the opportunity presented by covering a team that hadn't had success in recent years.
I enjoyed spending the season covering the team, seeing what it was like to follow a group of young women that played not in front of large crowds or for the hopes of a career beyond college, but because they love the game.
Getting to know the players and coaches and how much they cared about their sport and their team, even on the days when nothing seemed to go right, was pretty inspiring.
When the opportunity then arose to write a column about practicing with a sports team, I jumped at it, because it seemed to me that practicing with the field hockey team was the idea of being a fish out of water.
To say a unique experience awaited me was a bit of an understatement.
I had watched games for the bulk of two months and struggled until the last game to wrap my brain around exactly what was going on, so the smallest thoughts I had of knowing what I was getting into were likely to be incorrect.
When the final practice of the season rolled around, I headed up to N. Kerr Thompson Stadium both expecting the worst and hoping for the best.
I certainly didn't help matters off to a good start by wearing shorts on a chilly evening made worse by the usual biting winds that come to the Slippery Rock campus.
I jumped right into practice, which began with a simple stick handling drill, and it was only a few seconds before the first shouts of "Oh no, you can't do that!" rained down on me.
I had made the mistake of playing field hockey like I had always played hockey, tapping the ball from side to side.
In field hockey, there's a catch.
The stick has a straight side and a curved side, and you have to play the ball with the curved side of the stick at all times, which means rolling the stick over in your hands, a much more challenging skill to learn.
"I think that's easily one of the things that gets overlooked in our sport," head coach Stacey Hart said. "There's a very high level of stick work and hand-eye coordination involved, and it's unique to our sport. It's the same as ice hockey, but totally different."
I certainly found that to be the case at several points during the practice.
I had a general idea of what was going on in terms of the motions of the players from my past playing ice hockey, but was repeatedly tripped up or slowed down when I had to focus on using the stick to carry the ball up the field or through the attacking zone.
Coach Hart was impressed with my play, but also wasn't surprised by my struggles.
"Your past experience works both with you and against you," Hart said. "It gives you some idea of what to do, but also works against you since field hockey has such a unique feel to it."
That certainly proved to be true, as I did notice a different feel to the game - particularly in my lower back.
Field hockey uses a fairly short stick, as the available sticks tend to vary in length, but the longest ones come in at just over three feet long.
It creates a situation where you have to get used to running up and down the field in a squat or suffer the consequences of running around doubled over at the waist.
With my lack of experience, my muscles were doomed either way, but it gave me a newfound respect for how physical the game can be, even when running free and untouched.
After a breakaway drill that included both myself and the athletic trainers, the time came for a scrimmage, and I felt my muscles tense up a bit whenever I heard Coach Hart say "Nick, you go ahead and play forward."
Sure, I was faced with less responsibility than a goaltender or a defender, but it still meant the seemingly daunting task of having to actually engage myself in the flow of a game without embarrassing myself.
I worried much less once I got involved, mostly because I took the simplest route possible - I found someone from the other team, hung around her, and followed the ball up and down the field.
All the hard work actually paid off, as the tail end of the scrimmage found me headed on a free run down the far sideline.
Like most of my other attempts at looking cool, that opportunity left me whiffing badly as I was unable to put together everything I had learned.
For an evening where I started off feeling like I was flying blind, I am proud of not looking silly, especially if it ended with the pure rush of flying down the sideline towards the same goal as everyone else.
Rocket Assistant Sports Editor
| |
|
When I first started writing for The Rocket at the beginning of this school year, I was afforded the opportunity to take my choice of which sport I would like to cover on a regular basis.
I chose to cover field hockey, and I did so for two reasons.
I was eager to tackle the challenge of writing about a sport I knew next to nothing about, but also the opportunity presented by covering a team that hadn't had success in recent years.
I enjoyed spending the season covering the team, seeing what it was like to follow a group of young women that played not in front of large crowds or for the hopes of a career beyond college, but because they love the game.
Getting to know the players and coaches and how much they cared about their sport and their team, even on the days when nothing seemed to go right, was pretty inspiring.
When the opportunity then arose to write a column about practicing with a sports team, I jumped at it, because it seemed to me that practicing with the field hockey team was the idea of being a fish out of water.
To say a unique experience awaited me was a bit of an understatement.
I had watched games for the bulk of two months and struggled until the last game to wrap my brain around exactly what was going on, so the smallest thoughts I had of knowing what I was getting into were likely to be incorrect.
When the final practice of the season rolled around, I headed up to N. Kerr Thompson Stadium both expecting the worst and hoping for the best.
I certainly didn't help matters off to a good start by wearing shorts on a chilly evening made worse by the usual biting winds that come to the Slippery Rock campus.
I jumped right into practice, which began with a simple stick handling drill, and it was only a few seconds before the first shouts of "Oh no, you can't do that!" rained down on me.
I had made the mistake of playing field hockey like I had always played hockey, tapping the ball from side to side.
In field hockey, there's a catch.
The stick has a straight side and a curved side, and you have to play the ball with the curved side of the stick at all times, which means rolling the stick over in your hands, a much more challenging skill to learn.
"I think that's easily one of the things that gets overlooked in our sport," head coach Stacey Hart said. "There's a very high level of stick work and hand-eye coordination involved, and it's unique to our sport. It's the same as ice hockey, but totally different."
I certainly found that to be the case at several points during the practice.
I had a general idea of what was going on in terms of the motions of the players from my past playing ice hockey, but was repeatedly tripped up or slowed down when I had to focus on using the stick to carry the ball up the field or through the attacking zone.
Coach Hart was impressed with my play, but also wasn't surprised by my struggles.
"Your past experience works both with you and against you," Hart said. "It gives you some idea of what to do, but also works against you since field hockey has such a unique feel to it."
That certainly proved to be true, as I did notice a different feel to the game - particularly in my lower back.
Field hockey uses a fairly short stick, as the available sticks tend to vary in length, but the longest ones come in at just over three feet long.
It creates a situation where you have to get used to running up and down the field in a squat or suffer the consequences of running around doubled over at the waist.
With my lack of experience, my muscles were doomed either way, but it gave me a newfound respect for how physical the game can be, even when running free and untouched.
After a breakaway drill that included both myself and the athletic trainers, the time came for a scrimmage, and I felt my muscles tense up a bit whenever I heard Coach Hart say "Nick, you go ahead and play forward."
Sure, I was faced with less responsibility than a goaltender or a defender, but it still meant the seemingly daunting task of having to actually engage myself in the flow of a game without embarrassing myself.
I worried much less once I got involved, mostly because I took the simplest route possible - I found someone from the other team, hung around her, and followed the ball up and down the field.
All the hard work actually paid off, as the tail end of the scrimmage found me headed on a free run down the far sideline.
Like most of my other attempts at looking cool, that opportunity left me whiffing badly as I was unable to put together everything I had learned.
For an evening where I started off feeling like I was flying blind, I am proud of not looking silly, especially if it ended with the pure rush of flying down the sideline towards the same goal as everyone else.
MHF president Tengku Abdullah (right) and Hyundai-Sime Darby Motors Sdn Bhd division vice president Datuk Lawrence Lee at the presentation of the three cars in Kuala Lumpur yesterday. — Pic: KHALID REDZATHE Malaysian Hockey Federation (MHF) has yet to find a suitable foreign coach, and the early indication is that Tai Beng Hai will hold the reins at least until the Asia Cup in Dubai.
MHF president Tengku Abdullah Sultan Ahmad Shah said yesterday: "I know we promised a foreign coach months ago, but have yet to sign one.
"The reason is because the top coach we wanted said he is going to retire from hockey soon, while the one we are negotiating with now has asked far more than what we expected."
MHF is said to have approached Australia's Terry Walsh, who had a stint in Malaysia in the 1980s, while its negotiations with another Aussie has almost reached a stalemate as his asking price plus benefits is too high for the MHF to consider.
The MHF council, after the elections in November, decided not renew the contracts of then national coach Sarjit Singh, assistant coach Gurmit Singh and goalkeepers coach Shahid Ali Khan which expired on Dec 31.
Instead, Tai Beng Hai and Nor Saiful Zaini were appointed caretaker coaches until a foreign replacement is found.
"We will make an announcement in a day or two on what we plan to do next. And if we can't get a foreign coach, we will look for the best in Malaysia.
"The caretaker coaches will also stay in the coaching group, as we will not sideline them but strengthen the coaching outfit instead, by adding more to the list," said Tengku Abdullah, who was speaking to the media after receiving three cars from Hyundai-Sime Darby Motors Sdn Bhd for MHF's official use in Kuala Lumpur yesterday.
The seniors have two major assignments this year, the Azlan Shah Cup on April 3-12 and the Asia Cup in Dubai on May 8-15.
The Asia Cup champions get a direct entry into the 2010 India World Cup.
Meanwhile, Junior World Cup organising committee chairman Tan Sri Admiral (Rtd) Anwar Mohd Nor said the International Hockey Federation (FIH) has given a 50 per cent discount on the 80,000 Swiss Francs (RM250,000) organising levy.
"And the 40,000 Swiss Francs will be equally shared by Singapore and Malaysia, thus bringing down the total organising cost."
Also, since visiting teams will be footing their own hotel and food bills, we are now looking at a much smaller budget," said Anwar.
While the local cost has yet to be finalised, the total shared cost with Singapore will come to about S$440,000 (RM1 million).
And a visit from FIH competitions committee chairman Dennis Meredith also brought more good news, as he returned happy with the progress of both pitches in Johor Baru.
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