All eyes will be on the Indian Men’s Hockey team as the FIH Hockey World Cup is only a few days away from now. The men in blue will have the crowd support as they will host the quadrennial event and hope that they can at least secure a podium finish. However former Pakistan hockey star Tahir Zaman feels that India have all the ingredients to win the World Cup and end a long 47 years break.
Zaman believes that with the support that comes from being the hosts there is a lot of pressure aswell and India will have to be very cautious in their approach and play a very consistent game throughout the tournament. Only then he sees his neighbours winning the FIH Men’s Hockey World Cup.
The former Pakistan captain who was very important in his country’s 1994 World Cup winning team shared how being the hosts have it’s fair share of challenges and advantages. “I would say India has a good chance this time. To be honest, home ground, home crowd advantage, but they should not forget that it can also be a disadvantage. The pressure of the home crowd and local media is something they have to be careful of,” Tahir Zaman stated.
It is ture that the fans have a lot of expectations from the Hockey team after the historic Olympic performance in Tokyo and then a silver medal at the Commonwealth Games leaving aside a shameful finale against Australia. So the fans feels that the hosts can definitely go far in this tournament and a place in the last three will be good enough for the country.
Zaman believes that the primary Hockey attributes of a successful team has to be staying disciplined while guarding your lines and also staying as consistent as possible. He believes that the Indian team has enough quality to win the World Cup.
“Apart from that, playing disciplined hockey, and not getting emotional will help. I would say the consistency I have noticed in the Indian team’s performance shows that they have everything that can make them the world champions this time,” he added.
India are in Pool D along with Spain, Wales and England and will be looking to top the pool as to qualify directly to the quarterfinals rather than playing an extra crossover game.
Speaking about his choices other than India, Zaman opened up on how different countries can win the World CUp with so much talent pool available to them this time.
“France and South Africa are the kinds of teams that can make any kind of upsets. But, on the other hand, Australia, Belgium, Germany, and perhaps Argentina are big teams to watch out for. I would rate Australia and the Netherlands higher than Belgium this time. But, let’s see how it goes. May the best team win the World Cup,” the former Pakistan captain concluded.
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