Future tense: Women’s hockey searches for answers after Olympic dream shattered

Ranchi: Ill-timed side-lining of experienced players, apparent inconsistency in tempo, and inability to address long-standing weaknesses — there would be plenty to ponder for the Indian women’s hockey team when it gets down to the arduous task of rebuilding for the next Olympic cycle after the shocking failure to qualify for Paris.

The 0-1 loss to Japan in the third-place match of the FIH Olympic Qualifiers here on Friday can seem stunning on the face of it but dig just a little bit deeper and it would be apparent that the debacle was a long time coming.

Skipper Savita Punia and her teammates had tears rolling down their dejected faces and all one could see in their eyes was uncertainty, perhaps a hint of fear too as to what awaits them next. “I don’t know,” said the team’s very shaken coach Janneke Schopman unable to articulate what the future holds for either her or her wards.

Hockey India has ruled out any drastic measures and quite frankly with an Olympic cycle lost, what would any drastic measure achieve at this point? The rebuilding process, after all, has to be a carefully thought out one. Having qualified for two consecutive Olympics in 2016 and 2020 after efforts of more than three decades, the Indian women made gradual progress at the world level.

The big moment under the sun was of course the Tokyo Olympics. There was no medal but the side’s gallantry in a campaign that fetched it the fourth spot won over the nation, which decided that these women deserved to be feted as much as those who came back with a medal around their necks.

So, what changed in a matter of three years? Where did the momentum go? The answer to these questions is not an all-encompassing one fact.

The first of the many reasons probably lies in the loss of their charismatic Dutch coach Sjoerd Marijne, who decided to pack his bags after Tokyo as he didn’t want to stay away from his family in a high-pressure job.

Marijne had created a very committed, happy unit that roared in Tokyo and Schopman, also from the Netherlands, was his assistant at that point. It looked like a smooth transition of role to her.

But clearly, she has struggled to get the balance right even though to her credit, the team did rise to its highest ever world number six standing on the back of some good performances.

And that’s why none could be faulted for believing that this team ought to have made it to Paris in the Asian Games last year, where a gold was needed to seal the deal.