NEW DELHI: Senior India hockey players cannot take their place in the side for the upcoming Asian Games for granted after the success of the junior women’s team in the Asia Cup in Japan rece-ntly, chief coach Janneke Schopman has said.
The junior women’s team returned to Bengaluru on Tuesday after displaying superb skills defeating four-time champions Korea 2-1 in the summit clash to clinch their maiden Asia Cup title in Kakamigahara, Japan on Sunday.
The Dutch tactician also said that while senior India players were “quite compe-titive”, the age of junior players will not come in the way of their selection in the India side for the Asian Games, to be held in Hangzhou, China in September-October this year.
“I was able to see everyone off the field and on the field and their performances. Let’s see what happens but the senior core group is quite competitive and people have to show up in every session to get selected,” Schopman, who coached the junior Asia Cup side, said in a virtual press conference on Tuesday.
“Age is not the deciding factor (for team selection for the Asian Games) and we winning the Junior Asia Cup means players showed up, so I (I’ll) definitely take that into consideration.
“I am quite happy with the performance of the players in the Junior Asia Cup and the thing for me was always to use the Australia tour and Junior Asia Cup to have 25 out of our 33 players (in core probables) performing,” she added.
Schopman also said she will complete the task of selecting the squad for the quadrennial continental showpiece this month, although the deadline set by the organisers is July 15.
“We always make selections quite early for bigger tournaments. Of course it makes a difference how players are performing this time, we have selection trials this month and the players need to be good at that time,” Schopman said.
She said the players in the Junior Asia Cup-winning squad, five of whom are already in the senior core group, will be up for selection in the Asian Games squad but the criteria will remain simple — “consistent performance in training”.
“For me, it’s about the big picture and I think everyone in the senior core group knows that you have to perform every single day in training and that’s what I look at. Currently our core group is pretty strong and we have five from the junior team already but everyone has a chance to make or break into the Asian Games team,” she said.
She added that having five junior players as part of the senior team during the five-match Australia tour had given the side a big advantage in the Junior Asia Cup.
“In Australia we tried different players in different positions. As a coach, you always build that in your mind. In the Junior Asia Cup we had five players from that team. These two events gave me valuable info. Every player brings in their own quality. The next couple of weeks will be about getting the right players in the squad,” she said.
“I was impressed with everyone. We scored a lot of goals. What was key was that the girls played to our principles and girls understood certain teams are playing defensive and how we can manipulate that.”
India forward Mumtaz Khan credited Schopman for the title and said the win, which helped India qualify for the Junior World Cup in Santiago, Chile at the end of the year, will motivate the team for greater glory.
“We played as a team in the last Junior World Cup but we learnt a lot from that bronze-medal loss. We understood the value of each second in the Asia Cup. We didn’t panic at all. We improved with time. Had Janneke not been there, we would not have won the medal. She supported us a lot and took care of everything,” she said. (PTI)