Winning mentality, hunger were missing: Head coach Harendra Singh

Head coach Harendra Singh has put the Indian hockey team's turnaround from a disastrous Commonwealth Games (CWG) to a silver-medal show at the FIH Champions Trophy (CT) down to change in hunger levels, self-belief and mindset of the players.

PR Sreejesh and his boys went down in penalty shootouts in a spirited performance against world champions Australia in the final, entering the title round after beating Olympic champions Argentina, Pakistan and holding Belgium and The Netherlands.

In this exclusive chat with DNA, Harendra analyses India's show in the final edition of CT:       

You're a coach who enters every tournament with the objective of winning. Are you satisfied with a silver in the CT?

Silver is not satisfactory. But the team performance has satisfied me. As a team, we have taken a few positive steps, which is very crucial. But if you talk about the medal, I'm not satisfied. This is the time we should've changed the colour, and we were very much there. I don't believe in waiting till penalty shootouts, because that is something that can go anyway. I believe we should've finished the game in the prescribed time.

From a poor show at the CWG to an impressive show in CT, what did you do to engineer the change after you replaced Sjoerd Marijne?

Once we had the change of guard, we had daily meetings including all the 48 players and the entire support staff. I told the boys, since 1975-80s, we have not reached even the semifinals of major tournaments in world hockey. I told them it's not that the past players were great and you boys are not. But, something is missing. I told them Indian hockey has reached a stage where it is on par with any other team in the world in terms of fitness and skills. But, there is something missing which I describe as winning mentality, hunger and the attitude of 'I want to be there'. I thing that's what we brought into this team.

I narrated a story to the boys. One soldier went up to the brigadier, and he said crying, 'Sir, we're surrounded by the enemy.' The brigadier responded, 'Good, now we can go and kill the opposition'. So, that's the positive mindset I wanted the team to have and I think they have shown that so far.

You also shuffled the team a bit, getting in some experienced players back into the set-up...

Yes, we brought some players back into the team like Sardar (Singh) and Ramandeep (Singh). I think that also gave the confidence to the youngsters that these people are there to rectify our mistakes and help us. There was good chemistry between the seniors and juniors.

If you see, the entire team was defending, and the entire team was in the opposition box. It's not that only the forwards will attack and defenders will defend. The team was helping each other. When opposition teams were pushing us hard in our own box, the entire team was back defending, like you saw against Belgium and The Netherlands.

The defence looked more organised in this tournament than at the CWG. There were few soft goals and moments of panic. Was it another priority for you?

I told the boys when I took over, 'How you defend is going to define the colour of your medal'. It's not only attack, but defence also wins you medals. I gave the example of Germany. In any major tournament, they are always there in semifinals or finals. Why? Because if they score on goal, they know how to defend that goal.

Again, the mindset had to change. When the opposition comes in to attack you, they're leaving their own house open and coming into ours. So, I told the boys to patiently wait, be calm, composed and controlled and wait for the opportunity where we can hurt them. Don't rush for the tackle, because we cannot tackle every ball. So, we worked upon such things, and the players have started understanding.

You talk of winning mentality and hunger. Will this performance instill more self-belief into the players – that they can beat the best of the teams in the world – heading into bigger tournaments later this year like Asian Games and World Cup?

Absolutely. Like I said, India under-performing wasn't the fault of Indian hockey. It's just that the players needed to be guided in what they want and how they want it. I told them, you will get more oxygen only once you reach the peak. Otherwise, you will continue to suffer in sixth or 10th or 12 position.

In today's world hockey, there is a very thin line between the top six teams. And that line is to know when we have the opportunity to score a goal, and we have the opportunity to defend.

This has shown that we can upset any top-10 team in the world. But I don't want anyone to look at it as an upset, and that it was our day. We want every day to be our day. That's where the hunger, mindset and belief that I was talking about kicks in.

And for that, you have to throw a lot of things out of the pitch. We made a big circle in the wall of the dressing room. Whatever was in our hands, we put it in the circle, and whatever isn't, we put it outside. We should not put any energy in thinking about things outside the circle. Those things can be for after the tournament. When it's game-time, it's only about the circle.

What were some of the key improvements that you saw in this team in the tournament, and what were the aspects that still need a lot of work on?

As a team, we have improved in our defence and attack. When we lose the ball, we have improved on how quickly we regain it. I can see the hunger in the players' body language and mind. They want to really hurt the opponents. I can see the change in personality on the pitch, they are not hiding behind the opponents and waiting for the ball. We are going forward and taking the attack to them. That shows the belief. We've improved with our fast counter-attacks, and creating circle penetrations.

The areas we can improve upon is penalty corner conversion, and conversion of goal-scoring opportunities inside the circle.

India won silver in the previous CT as well but there was a dramatic dip in results thereafter, most notably in the 2016 Rio Olympics. How can you ensure that the team maintains this level in bigger events this year?

Two things. One, we cannot sit back and start celebrating that we are the silver-medallists of Champions Trophy. That's history. We need to only carry the positives from there into our new chapter, which is the Asian Games.

Secondly, every team which has played this Indian team in the Champions Trophy will now come up with different ideas to counter us. We cannot sit back and think that we've done enough homework and we're doing well. We'll be thrown tougher questions by the opposition in the Asian Games and World Cup. We have to be able to answer those questions. We should throw our surprise element at the opposition before they throw theirs on us. And from now on, we will re-start on those lines.