Devindar Walmiki: India dream still alive

Devindar Walmiki during a practice session in the Netherlands recently

Age, they say, makes you wiser. But as he turns 29 today (Friday, May 28), hockey Olympian Devindar Walmiki remains as clueless as he was in 2017 about his sudden ouster from the Indian hockey set-up.

This, despite a goal-scoring India debut in the 2015 Hockey World League Semi-Final in Belgium, a decent individual outing at the 2016 Rio Olympics, a gold medal at the Asian Champions Trophy in Malaysia the same year and a winner's medal with Kalinga Lancers at the Hockey India League in 2017.

"Right from my India debut till the HIL title win in February 2017, I was always in the playing XI, never on the bench. So suddenly, in March 2017, to find myself out of the list of 48 players picked for the national camp was extremely shocking. Roelant Oltmans was India coach then and I asked him if it was a mistake but he said that he didn't know because my name was on his list of players, To date, I don't know the reason for my ouster as no one from Hockey India or the coaching staff has ever spoken to me about it," Devindar, who returned to the city on Thursday after his second successful season for Holland's HGC club in the Dutch top division league, told mid-day.

HGC's Devindar Walmiki during a Dutch top division league match in the Netherlands recently

Former India coach Paul van Ass is the head coach of HGC. "It was Paul who gave me my India break and he invited me to play for his club here for the second time. The level of hockey in Holland is very high. We [HGC] have beaten the national teams of Russia [2-1] and Malaysia [4-2]. Oltmans was Malaysia's coach at the time," added Devindar, who has also been coaching HGC's U-14 team.

The India dream, however, still lingers and haunts even. "I get dreams where my India teammates are calling out my name to pass the ball and as soon as I receive the ball, I wake up with a start. I'm very optimistic that if I keep working hard, my India dream will come true again. I'm hopeful of making it to the India camp after the Tokyo Olympics. My first coach Bawa [Marzban Patel] keeps telling me that such things happen to the best of players and that I should only control the controllables, which means continue to work hard on my game," added Devindar, who essays one of the most versatile roles for his club. "In modern hockey, you have to be ready to play in any position as and when the situation demands. I started out as a pure defender for HGC. Then, I moved into midfield and enjoy overlapping from both, the right and left flanks, like a forward. I've also played as a striker and even scored goals for HGC. I can think of only one other India player, who can do similar things, and that is Harmanpreet Singh. We played together in 2016 but that was for a brief period. If we are together again, we can work wonders for Team India. But for that, I need to first make it back to the India camp. I hope and pray that happens soon. That's my only birthday wish today," Devindar signed off.

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