India set to defeat world no 22 Russia: Men Hockey coach

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Reddit
  • Flipboard
  • Email
  • WhatsApp
India set to defeat world no 22 Russia: Men Hockey coach
India set to defeat world no 22 Russia: Men Hockey coach

New Delhi : India will aim to keep the winning momentum going as they face World No. 22 Russia on 1st and 2nd November 2019 here at the Kalinga Hockey Stadium. Indian Hockey Team men coach Graham Reid has shown confidence that team India will manage to bag the game.

Lately, the team won the FIH Men’s Series Finals Bhubaneswar 2019 in June, the Tokyo Olympics 2020 Test Event in August, and then all five of their matches against World Champions Belgium and World No. 8 Spain as part of their preparations for the much anticipated FIH Hockey Olympic Qualifiers Odisha.

“We have been in the process of debriefing our Belgium Tour to go back and work out what we did well, what were the things we needed to improve on, and then come up with the objectives that we are going forward with in the coming two weeks. We have almost finished that process and its been a really good exercise for the team, and it is also good for the players that they understand what are the things that they do when they are playing well. There were things like good pressure on the ball, good structure and those things were quite evident when we went back to see how we played in Belgium. We’ve had a good week here in Bhubaneswar to determine what were the outcomes from that preparatory tour, and now is the time to continue working in that direction,” said Reid.

Currently on Number 5 in the hockey rankings, India maintained their 100% winning record during the Belgium tour. Reid said, "For me, the good takeaways were that our GPS numbers were great, which means that the running, effort, speed and intensity was actually even higher than last year’s World Cup. So they were very good numbers for us to see, and for the players to understand that to play at that level, you need to be achieving those consistently. Another part was the consistency of our performances against Belgium and Spain, and it was good to see that we kept building momentum as the tour progressed."