India's hockey captain Rajpal Singh suggests foreign coach for job
Presently Hockey India (HI) is looking for the best coach to continue with India’s team. Rajpal Singh, captain of India’s men’s hockey team suggests choosing an Australian coach for the team.
Although, he had an unhealthy relationship with previous foreign coach Jose Brasa, he still suggests Hockey India follow Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) in picking up a foreign coach for the national team.
Singh blamed Jose Brasa for ill-treating him during recent World Cup matches. He also blamed Brasa for creating groups in the team. Rajpal is of the view that the national hockey federation should select the coach on a professional basis, and for him, an
Australian coach would be a suitable choice for the Indian men’s hockey team.
“Instead of randomly picking anybody, Hockey India should invite applications for the post of chief coach just like the BCCI. The coach can be a foreigner or Indian but what matters is his performance and attitude towards players. Personally, I am in favour
of Australian coach", Rajpal advised.
The Indian cricket team is hugely successful because they have professionally chosen a support staff. We should adopt this in hockey also to avoid any controversy in future", he said. All this chaos regarding coaching India’s team started when Harendra Singh
resigned from his post as a coach after India’s dismal performance in the semi-final of Asian Games at Guangzhou.
While on the other hand, the chief coach Jose Brasa’s contract also expired after the Asian Games. Harendra reconsidered his decision and made his mind to withdraw his resignation but he wanted to be the only coach of the Indian team. When the matter was
to choose between Brasa and Harendra, Rajpal favoured the latter to be coach of the team.
However, now when HI has taken a decision to select a coach from other than these two, Rajpal turned his opinion to a foreign Australian coach. When Rajpal was asked about Harendra’s performance he could hardly give a final answer he just said, "In last
18 months Brasa was fully incharge of everything, so it is hard to comment on national coach as he hardly had anything to do. I think national coach should also be selected like the chief coach".
Rajpal emphasized that, whoever will be chosen as a coach of the national team, should be appointed for long time period. "I think a coach should be awarded contract for at least 10 years so that he can prepare a team in a better way", he said. He also said
that team should be favoured with appointment of foreign trainer and psychologist. In his view the Indian trainers are not that eligible to train the team according to international standards.
“We also need a foreign trainer as the trainers in India are not that good," said the Indian captain. "Definitely, sport psychologist will help us a lot and we need one", he added. He also disregarded the statements of Dhananjay Mahadik about his deliberate
poor performance in the recent Asian Games.
“His allegations are baseless and I can counter them but I don't want to give importance to him. One thing is clear that nobody can underperform while playing for the country. It is an honour for anyone to lead the country," he said. "Have you heard any
cricketer of accusing his team-mates? They never do it and this is one of the key reasons for their success. We should take a lesson from them", Rajpal added.
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