HI forms panel to review India's shoddy performance in WC

Hockey India constituted a strong 11-member committee to evaluate India's pathetic performance in the ongoing World Cup at The Hague, Netherlands.

India finished fifth in the six-team preliminary Group A, winning just one match and drawing one from their five outings. The fifth-place finish meant India will not be able to improve or retain their eight position of the 2010 World Cup in New Delhi.

India, who were ranked No 8 going into the World Cup, will now play for the ninth position play-off against Asian champions South Korea on Saturday.

The committee -- named as Team, Coaching and High Performance Evaluation Committee -- will consists of nine former players, a representative from the Sports Authority of India besides HI secretary general Narinder Batra as the chairman.

The former players, who will be part of the panel which will conduct post mortem of the team's performance, are Harbinder Singh, Ajit Pal Singh, Col Balbir Singh, B P Govinda, Ashok Kumar, S S Grewal, Jagbir Singh, A B Subbaiah and Samir Dad.

HI's chief executive officer Elena Norman of the committee.

"The above has been necessitated after observing the men's team's performance in the 2014 World Cup at The Hague," HI secretary general Narinder Batra said in a statement.

"We should only be thankful to the team goalkeeper P R Sreejesh that we did not finish at the bottom of the pool to play for 11 and 12 positions, nothing could have been worse than that," he said.

"This committee from now on will evaluate all events and will also visit coaching camps to see if the things are moving in the right direction. This committee is for both men and women."

Batra informed that the performance review meeting will be a three-day affair and will be held here from June 30 till July 2.

The HI secretary general has sought a detailed presentation from HI's High Performance Director Roelant Oltmans, chif coach Terry Walsh and scientific advisor Mathew Eyles during the meeting.

Batra has also sought independent reports on India's below-par performance from the team's coaching staff, which includes Oltmans, Walsh along with other coaching staff members like M K Kaushik and Sandeep Sangwan.

In the absence of the core coaching staff, Jude Felix has been entrusted with the responsibility of handling the national camp during those three days.