Good show expected from India: Coach

It may be mentioned that four UP players—Amit Prabhakar,M Amir Khan,Pramod Kumar and Hamza Mujtaba have also made it to the team.

Talking about India’s performance in the last edition of the tournament,Lobo informed,“ India had won a silver then. India had defeated Pakistan 2-0 in the league match but it lost by 3-2 against Pakistan in the final match,” he explained.

“We will be playing against Sri Lanka,Nepal,Bangladesh and Pakistan and we expect the main challenge to come from Pakistan. Bangladesh has also got some good players.”

The seasoned coach said that the team has a very good forward line.

“I am quite content with the overall performance and the efforts of the players during the camp,the only thing is that sometimes the boys tend to make ‘silly mistakes’ regarding their positioning sometimes. Perhaps this is due to lack of enough international exposure or because of not being strong enough as their senior counterparts to make swift moves on the turf.”

With less than a week left for the team’s departure to Dhaka,a very interesting aspect about the month-long camp has been that the “gag-orders” from Hockey India still continue to exist. Ever since crises emerged at the Pune camp where the World Cup probables had gone on strike,there has been a strict “no,no”for the media. Even after the announcement of the team,team coach expressed his inability to let the players talk to The Indian Express. “I just had a talk with the Hockey India and I have been asked not to allow any player interact with the media for the time being.”

The Team: Goalkeepers: Mrinal Choubey,Harjit Singh; Defenders: V Raghunath,Innocent Kullu,Amit Prabhakar; Midfielders: Ajitesh Roy,Roshan Minz,Birendar Lakra Jr,Varinderjit Singh,Belsejar Horo,Vikas Pillay; Forwards: Pramod Kumar,M Amir Khan,Bikas Toppo,Dharamvir Singh,Yuvraj Walmiki,Prabhdeep Singh,Humza Mujtaba.