Indian coach exudes confidence

SYDNEY, OCT. 5. Indian hockey team coach Rajinder Singh, on Friday, promised a better showing by his side in the 7th Junior World Cup hockey tournament scheduled to be held at Hobert (Tasmania) from November 9 to 21.

The Indian team finished its acclimatisation camp here and Rajinder Singh exuded confident after his team's good showing in the warm up matches at the Olympic Park.

``There have been some grey areas which have been addressed during the work-out here. Penalty corner conversion, defence, tackling, field goals and goal keeping were some areas we had to work out,'' the coach said.

``We hope we could improve upon our second place finish of 1997 at Milton Keynes and upstage the host, Australia, which was the winner last time,'' the coach said.

India, which is placed in pool `C` along with Scotland and Spain, take on Canada in the first match on October 9.

The 2001 event, for the first time, has been expanded to involve 16 nations.

All matches will be played on the world class Tasmanian hockey centre surfaces at Cornelian Bay. These facilities will be expanded to accommodate over 5,000 spectators, with seating for up to 3,000.

The centre contains two Balsam Pacific water based SLX synthetic playing surfaces, and is situated approximately 10 minutes travel time from the city centre. The majority of the matches (55 out of 64) will be played on the main pitch.

Indian Hockey Federation (IHF) secretary K. Jothikumaran and Satinder Kumar have been named judge and umpire, respectively, for the championship.

The Junior World Cup, an event for under-21 players was created to give them international competition and prepare them for senior international hockey. It is played every four years and uses the same format as the World Cup.

The previous venues and medal winners were: 1979 (Versailles): Pakistan (gold), Germany (silver), The Netherlands (bronze); 1982 (Kuala Lumpur) Germany, Australia, Pakistan; 1985 (Vancouver): Germany, The Netherlands, Pakistan; 1989 (Malaysia): Germany, Australia, Pakistan; 1993 (Barcelona): Germany, Pakistan, Australia; 1997 (Milton Keynes): Australia, India, Germany.

- UNI

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