Indian hockey coach Craig Fulton sets sights on Asian Games gold

Head coach Craig Fulton (second from left) talks to Indian players in Eindhoven recently. Pic/HOCKEY INDIA

The Asian Games (September 23 to October 8) is less than three months away, but before that, the Indian men's hockey team have two tournaments to tackle. They will first leave for a four-nation event in Spain this month, where England and the Netherlands will be the other teams in the fray. Then, they will play in the Asian Champions Trophy in Chennai in August. However, head coach Craig Fulton's mind is understandably already occupied with thoughts of the Asian Games.

Pressure of expectation

The South African had a broad smile on his face when mid-day asked him about the high expectations of a gold medal from his World No. 4 and top-ranked Asian team at the Asian Games in Hangzhou, China, assuring them of a ticket to the 2024 Paris Olympics.

Also Read: Women's hockey team should have had more international matches this year, rues Vandana

"There are two ways to look at things. There is the ideal goal and a real goal. The ideal goal is to win whatever tourney you take part in. And the realistic goal is to see how far you are ranked or how far you are from the top teams. We are one of the top teams so these two [ideal and real] match up nicely," Fulton said during a virtual media interaction organised by Hockey India. Fulton, however stressed that there are certain processes that need to be followed for that gold medal achievement.

"We have the process of selection, where we need to find out which are the best combinations in the group. Then, we have to be as fit as possible. And finally, tactics will be crucial. So, we go to Spain to play tough opposition in England and Holland. That's a great place to test things. Then we come to Chennai for the Asian Champions Trophy, where we have Asian opposition, so we will have to switch between the two styles.

"We obviously want to qualify for the Olympics through the Asian Games as we don't want to go through the other qualifying tournaments later. But we have these processes before that and if we put our best effort into these processes, I'm sure the results will take care of themselves," he added. Fulton, who took over the reins of the national team after Australian Graham Reid quit following the World Cup in Odisha earlier this year, admitted that he hasn't seen all the core group players in competition mode yet.

Rotation of players

"I haven't seen much of all the players yet. At the Pro League, we could only take 24 players and our core group has 39. We will be taking 24 again to Spain and give a few other players the opportunity, so I get to see everyone in competition. Then, at Chennai, in addition to the 24 returning from Spain, we will have two extra players joining from Bangalore. We will pick a team of 18 for the Asian Champions Trophy and while they will compete, the rest of the players will train on the side. The Asian Games isn't too far away, so we have to keep training," Fulton concluded.