Oltmans’ thumbs up to new HIL rule

Indian hockey’s chief coach Roelant Oltmans on Tuesday gave a thumbs up to the new goal-scoring rule to be introduced in next year’s Hockey India League, but felt if the system is used at the international level, world champion Australia will definitely have an edge over others. Oltmans was full of praise for the new system but jokingly said he was relieved that the new rule will not be in place at the Rio Olympics.

“The nice thing about hockey is that it’s always searching for new ideas, new developments. For many years people have been saying that penalty corners have too much of an influence on the final results of the game, so I think it’s a good idea to test new things in this kind of major events and see how it works out,” Oltmans told PTI ahead of the team’s practice session at the Major Dhyan Chand National Stadium here.