The Indian women's hockey team stunned Australia in the quarter-finals of the Tokyo Olympics on Monday and immediately fans began comparing coach Sjoerd Marijne to the fictional character 'Kabir Khan', portrayed by Shahrukh Khan in the Bollywood movie Chak de India.
India beat Australia 1-0 to advance to the semi-finals. It is the first time that the women's hockey team made it to the last four stage at the Games.
"Sorry family, I coming again later (sic)," tweeted Marijne alongside a photo with the entire hockey squad.
As soon as he posted the photo on Twitter, fans started comparing him to Kabir Khan and how the reel story transformed into a real story.
"Two people who transformed Indian women's hockey team. Kabir Khan (reel life). Sjoerd Marijne (real life)," tweeted one user.
Many users also shared a GIF of Shahrukh Khan from the movie Chak de India as the entire country continues to marvel at the achievement of the women's hockey side.
In the Bollywood film Chak de India, Shahrukh Khan's character 'Kabir Khan' guides the women's team to the world title. In the film, Shahrukh is famous for playing the coach who guides the women's team to the title in the World Championship.
The movie is often said to be inspired by the story of former India hockey goalkeeper Mir Ranjan Negi. But the former goalkeeper and the makers clarified that it wasn't his story and the makers did not have an idea about Negi's story when the scripting was done.
In what comes as a historic day, and possibly the greatest moment for women's hockey in India, Gurjit Kaur scored the lone goal in the match in the first half through a penalty-corner.
