Powered by the imported players, Assam men’s hockey team on Saturday upset Punjab, known as a cradle of hockey in the country, 5-3.
GUWAHATI: Following the footsteps of Qatar at the Asian Games and Andhra Pradesh at domestic level, Assam has lured players from various states to boost its prospects in hockey at the 33rd National Games.
Powered by the imported players, Assam men’s hockey team yesterday upset Punjab, known as a cradle of hockey in the country, 5-3. But, there was a little in the host side which could be termed Assamese.
Not more than three of the 16 players of the team were from Assam with the rest being assembled from various states such as Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Manipur and Uttar Pradesh.
The players who originally belonged Assam were Manoj Das, Swapan Kumar Das and Saurav Goswami.
The squad featured names such as Rajnish Mishra, Sameer Dad and Brojen Singh, who have played international matches and played with distinction for their states or employers. In fact, the victory, which sent the home fans at the Maulana Md Tayabullah hockey stadium at Bhetapara into a frenzy was to a large extent, was fashioned by goals from Dad (two), Manipur’s Chinglensana Singh and Brojen Singh Thokchom.
In the last edition of the Games in Hyderabad, hosts Andhra Pradesh had hired several players from other states by offering them handsome incentives.
This time around, Assam is offering Rs 3 lakh for gold medallists and Rs 2 lakh and Rs 1 lakh for silver and bronze winners respectively.
The same is the case with the state’s women’s hockey team which had a lot of the players hailing from other states. In fact, most of them are from Punjab while some are from Orissa and northeastern states. The three local girls on the team sheet for today’s match against Uttar Pradesh were Kanmai Moran, Rupama Gogoi and Suprobha Deury.
“Some of the outside players stay in Assam while some have been hired just to play in these National Games,” a source said. “It is not known whether they will stay or return to their native states after the Games,” he added.
However, the source claimed that such a situation had happened only in hockey whereas in other disciplines, Assam was fielding own players.
“There is a sizeable number of Assam Police personnel in the contingent,” a Games official said.
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