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Entire team deserves credit: coach
Indian eves hold Aussies Captaincy toughest job, says Ganguly |
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Bhowmick's agenda for East Bengal
German players get sausage treatment Tyson getting ready for comeback fight Golf — the love that cost Colin Montgomerie his marriage 2 US athletes suspended for THG
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Entire team deserves credit: coach New Delhi, April 30 “This is the best gift we could have given to the country and this is the happiest moment in my life. By beating Pakistan on their home soil, we showed how hockey is played,” Harendra told reporters on arrival from Pakistan, where they beat the hosts 5-2 in the final to clinch the Asia Cup. “The loss in the Azlan Shah Cup was in my mind when we started our campaign. I was waiting for the opportunity to take on Pakistan and take revenge. I am happy that we have achieved what we wanted,” he said. Harendra was the coach of an experimental Indian team that took part in the Azlan Shah Cup in Malaysia in January this year. India finished last in the event with one draw and five losses, which included the 2-3 defeat against Pakistan. Harendra said it was dream of every Indian player to beat Pakistan on their home soil and with the win his boys proved that they were “tougher” than their arch-rivals. “Mindgames come to the fore whenever the two sides meet. My boys proved that they are tougher than their opponents. “It’s a dream of every team to beat Pakistan in Pakistan. It’s the ultimate achievement for a player,” he said. Harendra said the title win had proved that some of the youngsters have gained the maturity needed to play at the highest level. “This team has played 30 matches so far with a 100 per cent record. This shows the mental toughness of the players. They are hungry for win which is very important to be successful at the highest level. “The players have matured enough and quite capable to play at the senior level. Now it is upto the selectors and the senior coach to decide,” he said. Even though individual brilliance was on display in the tournament, Harendra declined to give credit to any particular player for the win, saying “it was a collective effort and the entire team deserves credit for the win.” The 10-nation tournament saw penalty corner specialist Sandeep Singh emerge as the leading goal scorer with 16 goals, most of them coming through drag flicks. But Harendra was not ready to compare him with ace penalty corner expert Jugraj Singh, who is out of action following a road accident last year. “It’s too early to compare him with Jugraj Singh, who is a great player. I hope he will come back. But we must be happy that a player of Jugraj’s calibre is coming up. So I think it is a double delight for Indian hockey lovers. Sandeep is no doubt a fine player and has a long future.” Harendra said his next aim is to help India retain the junior World Cup title that the team won in Hobart, Australia in 2001. “The boys are confident and I am looking forward to the World Cup in Amstelveen, Holland next year.” Captain Sandeep Michael said the emergence of young players would help the national team to a great extent. “Now that we have so many juniors who can play in the main team, it would definitely add to the bench strength. This win was a great all-round performance,” said Michael, who also plays for the senior national team. “We played some games against Pakistan this year and lost almost all of them. So this is a fantastic win. We would cherish it for a long time,” he added. Sandeep Singh, who scored two goals in the final against Pakistan, said he enjoyed playing against Pakistan and reserved his best for the arch-rivals. “I like playing against Pakistan and scoring against them. I try my best to score. I don’t mind if I fail to score against any other team, but against Pakistan my aim is to score as many goals as possible,” he said. The player also said he would like to get a place in team for the Olympics. “My aim is to play in the Olympics. If the selectors feel I deserve a place in the side then they will take me.” The team was welcomed at the airport among others by veteran player Dhanraj Pillay and goalkeeper Devesh Chauhan. “I was in the capital. So I thought of coming to the airport and greeting the team on its feat,” the mercurial forward said.
— PTI |
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Indian eves hold Aussies Buderim (Australia), April 30 After the first match in the series was cut short by a power failure and a second game called off due to fog, the visitors got off to a quick start after some defensive lapses by Australia. “It was a disappointing effort in the first 15 minutes, but once we got our structure back together and went back to our system, we managed to get at them,” Australian assistant coach Mark Hager said. An intercepted pass from a free hit led to the first goal as Mamta Kharab found enough space inside the circle to push wide of Australian goalkeeper Cindy Morgan. Kharab’s second goal three minutes later was initiated by Adline Kerkatta down the left and then India’s third came from a deflection on right post following a penalty corner. Good skills by Ngaire Smith on the right side of the circle created the first Australian goal. Bianca Netzler latched onto the loose ball and smashed it past Indian goalkeeper Helen Mary Innocent before the break. Australia drew level by the 43rd minute after Louise Dobson’s penalty corner strike and then on Netzler’s well-placed deflection. The teams play additional matches tomorrow and Sunday at the same venue.
— AP |
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Captaincy toughest job, says Ganguly New Delhi, April 30 “I know and I can guarantee you, it’s (captaincy) the hardest job in cricket. Azhar must have felt the same, Sachin must have felt the same. It’s a hard job but it’s also a challenge. It became more easy for me to lead the side because it was a young bunch,” Ganguly said in an interview to BBC World’s Asia Today programme. The skipper, credited with transforming the present team into a match-winning unit, said his men had learnt to fight hard on the field. “I think for the last two or three years we have got a crop of young boys who fight on the cricket field. I have never been a person who would stop them from competing, obviously within the rules, fight hard on the cricket field because that’s the way you win,” he said. “People talk about Rahul (Dravid). They say he is a quiet guy. He stays on his own but he’s pretty aggressive. If you see him on the cricket field, he won’t give you an inch whether he is fielding or batting. I think it is the whole unit. You watch their body language, you know they will be hard on the opposition.” Ganguly, who led India to historic triumphs in the one-day and Test series against Pakistan recently, said the victories there were “very special”. “It’s very special because it was the first series won outside India since I started playing in 1996. I think no other series in the world, even Australia plays England in the Ashes series, is as big as this. “You know it’s not just cricket. You know the involvement of people outside cricket is enormous. And you saw it during the one-day series, the last two games in Lahore — 10,000 to 12,000 people from India landed up to watch the games,” he said. India’s steady rise upwards also meant added pressure, conceded Ganguly, saying “the higher you go the more pressure it is. Obviously the pressure on Australia is bigger than the pressure on Zimbabwe. But then it’s positive pressure, it’s good.” Asked what makes him see through his lean patches, he said, “...You think about good times, the good knocks you have played. And you are one of the lucky few. So you know it’s a new day. And I’ve always believed that... it just takes you one evening to be famous.”
— PTI |
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Report confirms Shoaib’s injury Islamabad, April 30 A bone scan carried out by a team of nuclear physicians at the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Hospital revealed injury in the 11th left rib, caused probably due to “persistent stress”. Shoaib claims to have hurt his wrist as well as back when he fell on his followthrough on the second day of the Pindi Test which India went on to win by an innings and 131 runs. His refusal to bowl on the crucial third day but showing no apparent discomfort while batting led to speculation that he may have feigned the injury. Meanwhile, Pakistan Cricket Board’s CEO Rameez Raja clarified that a scan had not been done on Shoaib during the Pindi Test. “A bone scan was not conducted then to ascertain his position. We still have to see how old his injury is, how bad was it during the Pindi Test. The medical commission has to look into the technicalities of the injury and give their recommendations,” Raja was quoted as saying in the media. He also said the medical commission had also viewed the videos of Shoaib's bowling, fall and batting during the Pindi test and would give their report after taking everything into consideration. “The idea of having this medical commission is not to condemn any player... we want everything to be crystal clear.” Meanwhile, Pakistan Cricket Board today accused a reputed hospital, run by the legendary Imran Khan, of “leaking” the medical report of controversial speedster Shoaib Akhtar even before the inquiry panel could have had a look at it. Expressing shock over the leaked report, PCB spokesman Sami-ul Hasan said the tests were conducted by the four-member medical commission at the Shaukat Khanum Hospital at Lahore only because it “had the best equipment”. “We had no idea that they would leak the results. No hospital does it,” Hasan said. The PCB official accused the hospital of resorting to “unethical practice” of leaking the report to the media even before the commission could evaluate it. State-run PTV went to town citing the report by a team of nuclear physicians of the hospital in its news bulletins today. The entire report found its way on the front page of a vernacular daily ‘Jung’ complete with the hospital’s logo. The hospital officials, in turn, blamed Shoaib’s brother Shahid for leaking the report to the media. Shahid was quoted as saying by local daily ‘The News’ that he had released the report to the media to prove that his brother was “completely committed” to the Pakistan team. “I just want to stress that
Shoaib is completely committed to the Pakistan team. All the success and fame he enjoys is because of the
country and the green blazer. There is no way he can think about deliberately letting the team down at any stage of his career,” Shahid said.
— PTI |
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Pak keen to play at Abu Dhabi: Inzy Dubai, April 30 He said the Abu Dhabi Cricket Control Board (ADCCB) had invited the Pakistan team and the players were very much looking forward to playing in the UAE. Reacting to a media report which quoted a Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) official as saying that the PCB was clueless about both the proposed match as well as the participation of the Pakistan players, Inzamam said the team had been approached and it had agreed to play. “I have confirmed to the ADCCB official that I will be playing the match and so have all the other current players,” Inzamam told the ‘Gulf News’ daily here on phone from Pakistan. The ADCCB officials have all along stated that PCB officials and a top-ranked BCCI official were contacted before approaching the respective set of players. Inzamam, however, wondered whether the match “was on” following the negative response from the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). BCCI President Jagmohan Dalmiya has said the board was not in the know of such an event and would not release its current players for the game. The ADCCB officials, who are in India to persuade the officials concerned to release the players for the exhibition match, sounded confident yesterday. “We are trying and are very optimistic that the Indian Cricket Board will release the players to make our inaugural match at the Sheikh Zayed Stadium a memorable one,” BR Shetty, ADCCB President and Managing Director said. When his attention was drawn to the PCB official’s statement that they were clueless about the proposed match, Shetty said all the players of Pakistani team have signed to play in the May 14 match.
— PTI |
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Bhowmick's agenda for East Bengal Kolkata, April 30 And going by the mood in the East Bengal camp, Subhas will have his way after having shepherded the team to grand success in recent times. East Bengal have had a complete turnaround in the last two years during which they have gone on to etch their names both in national and international record books. “I have asked the club that they will have to repose confidence in me for a decent period of time. With a team like this and the way they are performing the expectations are rising. Coming back from a goal down against Mohun Bagan and then winning tells a lot about this team’s character. So this team has to learn to live with pressure,” he said. Bhowmick wants the officials to promise an evaluation only at the end of the season. “Every second day I was reading in the papers that my job was at stake. All this has to change,” he said. He also demanded that a code of conduct be formed for the players, where he would be the sole authority and the players answerable to him, which among other things would be looked into in matters of practice sessions and attendance. “The players can always appeal and justify their stance in front of the Board of Directors to ensure there are no personal grievances. My players are like my children. I care for them, but when it comes to football, discipline is absolutely necessary,” he added. Bhowmick also wants sole authority and responsibility in selecting the team, something to which the club seems to have given a wholehearted support. He seems to have already handed over his demand list, which includes most of the players from the last season and a few others. “The idea is to retain the nucleus of the side and recruit two or three new players. This is how teams grow in stature. But I can’t divulge any more now,” he said. |
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Maradona
leaves hospital Buenos Aires, April 30 The Swiss-Argentina hospital said in a statement yesterday that Maradona had been allowed to leave in line with the wishes of his family and personal doctor. The Todo Noticias channel said the 43-year-old Maradona left the clinic in a vehicle with darkened windows so as not to be seen. Police halted traffic outside the establishment to let the ailing star pass, it said. According to Todo Noticias, the football star, who has been battling drug addiction for several years, was given permission by doctors to continue his recuperation elsewhere. Maradona was at one stage was said to be fighting for his life in the clinic. But he has made a steady recovery in recent days. Press reports said Maradona has been joking with doctors about bringing him a ball so he can prove he is recovering. “Bring me a ball so that I can show them I’m well,” he was quoted as saying. The last medical report on Wednesday said his condition was stable with progressive improvement of the cardio-pulmonary system and that he no longer had a fever and the only medication he was taking were antibiotics.
— AFP |
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Beckham
leaving Real Madrid? London, April 30 Beckham’s wife Victoria has refused to set up home in Madrid despite the England captain’s alleged affairs and the Daily Telegraph reported Beckham’s major sponsors, who arrange long-range marketing strategies around the player, were discussing a move to London. Family sources told The Telegraph it was a “certainty” the player would be back in London in the summer. Real Madrid, unhappy with the disruptive effect of having the world’s most famous player on their books, have banned British newspaper reporters in an attempt to protect their star player. An opponent to Real President Florentino Perez in the club elections has already said he would sell Beckham if he takes over at the club. But Real refused to comment on the claims.
— AFP |
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German players get sausage treatment Berlin, April 30 All the players in the starting line-up of Wednesday’s fiasco were pictured with their bodies replaced by frankfurters on the front page of today’s Bild daily. A national delicacy but also a popular word for naming those hopeless at football or anything else, the sausage was an obvious choice for the top-selling newspaper. Two days after the friendly in Bucharest, Bild dedicated two full pages to a defeat that has left the football-mad nation in a state of shock. Bild put Germany coach Rudi Voeller under pressure to kick some players out of the squad and bring in new talent. Voeller, who said after Germany’s worst away defeat in 65 years that all he could do was apologise to everyone, remained calm. “It is too early to say anything,” he said when asked whether some players might be dropped. “There were things I didn’t like which must be addressed but first of all I must analyse the game again quietly.” Voeller, who was missing several important players through injury, is expecting to name his 23-man squad for Euro 2004 on May 24. The three-times
world and European champions, who have often bounced back from similar misfortunes, will play the Netherlands, the Czech Republic and Latvia in a tough group
D in the finals in Portugal starting on June 12. — Reuters |
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Tyson getting ready for comeback fight Las Vegas, April 30 Tyson’s manager, Shelly Finkel, said yesterday the former champion probably would return to the ring on July 31 against journeyman Kevin McBride. Finkel said negotiations were continuing over a site and possible pay-per-view broadcast. “We should have something definite by next week,” Finkel said. “There’s a lot of anticipation for him to come back.” The fight will be the first for Tyson since February 22, 2003, when he knocked out Clifford Etienne in 49 seconds in Memphis, Tennessee. That was supposed to be the first of a series of comeback bouts for Tyson, who was stopped by Lennox Lewis in the eighth round of his previous fight. But Tyson hasn’t been in the ring since, and until recently said he wasn’t sure if he wanted to fight again. With the heavyweight division lacking a big name champion following the retirement of Lewis, however, the 37-year-old Tyson apparently has the itch. “I’m totally confident about that,” Finkel said, referring to Tyson’s desire to fight. Tyson has been a fixture in recent months at boxing cards and drew more applause than the main event boxers when he showed up earlier this month at Madison Square Garden for heavyweight title fights involving Chris Byrd and John Ruiz.
— AP |
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Golf — the love that cost Colin Montgomerie his marriage London, April 30 Europe’s finest player for much of his 14-year marriage, Montgomerie announced yesterday that he was separating from his wife Eimear with a view to divorce. In a terse statement, the 40-year-old Briton said it was a “desperate decision for us both and a painful time for the family”. A friend of the couple described him as being “destructed” by the split. She said nobody else was involved in the break-up. Golf, though, is firmly in the frame as the guilty third party. Montgomerie, blessed with more money than he can ever need, a palatial home in the heart of the English countryside and a European record of seven Order of Merit titles, has paid a high price for his relentless drive for success. The couple, who have three children, briefly split in 2000. In his autobiography ‘The Full Monty’, Montgomerie blamed it on his obsession with his profession. “What was happening was, little by little, golf was taking over. I was bringing my golf home and even when I was there, I wasn’t giving as much attention to Eimear and the children as I should have done. I was constantly thinking of something else. “I wasn’t a proper husband or a proper father. It almost broke my life,” he wrote. Ever since he joined the professional ranks in 1988 and became the European rookie of the year, “Monty” has believed that only 100 per cent dedication would do if he wanted to realise all his ambitions. Golfers these days pride themselves on physical fitness and a clear head — Tiger Woods, the runaway world No 1, has set that example. The money can be good but it’s hard work. Every player devotes hours to the practice range and putting greens before and after the five hours or so spent on the course during tournaments. As often as not this is followed by more time in the gym or testing new equipment. The days when golfers propped up the bar after a round of golf are long gone. Players who fail to make the halfway cut earn nothing and the costs of travelling around Europe and beyond come to well over $ 50,000 on a tour which runs for 10 months of the year. Despite all his dedication, Montgomerie has still failed to fulfil his ultimate golfing ambition of winning one of the sport’s four major titles. He is now ranked 45th in the world and very much a declining force. Montgomerie is by no means the only player whose family life has crumbled in a relentless search for success. Sandy Lyle, the former British Open and US Masters champion, was one of the first to commiserate with his fellow Scot on hearing the news in Milan yesterday. “It’s such a shame,” he told Reuters. “The main thing now is just to make sure the children are okay.” He was speaking from experience as his first marriage fell apart in the late 1980s. The game is littered with similar casualties — Fred Couples, Nick Faldo and John Daly to name but three leading players from the 1990s have gone through a divorce. All are reckoned to have put golf before family and all the evidence suggests that when they switched the balance, their games suffered. David Duval, the 2001 British Open champion, is possibly the best example of this. He won in Royal Lytham with a game based on clockwork efficiency, a honed physique based on many a hard hour in the gym and a frightening intensity. Having attained his ultimate goal, his hunger for glory was inevitably blunted and he discovered that there were other things to life than winning golf tournaments. In March this year, he married and inherited three stepchildren. He is fulfilled as an individual and his game has rarely been in worse shape. From world ranked No 1 in the late 1990s, he slipped into the 200s last year. As many have commented in relation to the recently engaged Woods, the true test of Tiger’s greatness will come only once he gets married.
— Reuters |
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2 US athletes suspended for THG Colorado Springs (USA), April 30 The two are the first American athletes to be suspended for using THG since it was discovered last summer. The suspensions followed hearings before the same three-member panel of the American Arbitration Association (AAA)/North American Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). In Price’s case, the panel concluded that “the use of such a powerful anabolic steroid could be for no other purpose than to enhance an athlete’s performance in violation of the spirit and absolute proscriptions of the IAAF (International Association of Athletics Federations) doping rules.” The panel in McEwen’s case “echoed that conclusion,” the USADA statement said. USADA chief executive Terry Maden said yesterday the decision “confirms the tremendous work of all those who believe in drug-free sport.” Price won the women’s hammer at last year’s US outdoor championships at Stanford, California, but the sample collected during that
meeting on June 19, and one from an out-of-competition test on July 29, later proved positive for THG. She has been suspended for two years from all sanctioned competition beginning on April 15, 2004, the date of her arbitration hearing, the USADA said. In addition, all of Price’s competitive results are disqualified from the date of the positive test, including not only her 2003 US title but also her 12th-place finish at the 2003 world outdoor championships in Paris.
— AFP |
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New Delhi, April 30
