‘The way I was made women’s coach was disrespectful’
Press Trust of India
Sjoerd Marijne has played his part in scripting Olympic history but the outgoing women’s hockey team chief coach still has scars of what he feels was a “disrespectful” transition back in 2018, when he was shunted out from men’s side after the Commonwealth Games disappointment.
The former Dutch player came to the country to take over
NEW DELHI:
the Indian women’s team in 2017 but was appointed the chief coach of the men’s side later that year.
However, in 2018, he was redesignated as the women’s coach in a rejigging of roles with Junior World Cup-winning coach Harendra Singh taking charge of the men’s side.
But that bitter episode is still fresh in Marijne’s mind as he left the country after a successful four-year stint. “Of course, I was not really happy with the transition. I was not really happy with what happened, the way it happened with the men’s team and I don’t think that was fairly respectful,” Marijne said after reaching India from a medal-less but successful Olympics. “But the moment I returned back to women, Savita (goalkeeper) came to my room and said ‘Listen we are really happy you are back’. That moment for me was the changing moment. I felt OK it’s good to be there again.”
Marijne felt if given a longer time, he could have achieved a lot with the men’s side. “But people shouldn’t misunderstand me. It was not that I was disappointed to go back to women’s team, I was not happy the way they handled it with men’s team because I left on a really good moment. On one side you have the opportunity to work with the most challenging team in the world in Indian men and on the other I was doing Indian women and we were just going up. So it was a really difficult decision and I am happy how it ended. I am happy with what I did with the women’s team, so no grudges,” he said.
Under Marijne, the Indian women did the unthinkable in Tokyo Olympics, reaching the semi-finals for the first time by stunning three-time champions Australia 1-0 in the quarter-finals. The Indians narrowly missed out on bronze, losing 3-4 to higher ranked Great Britain in the third place playoff. “I am proud of what we have achieved as a team, the legacy we have created. I am extremely happy for the girls because they now can feel what it is to have success,” Marijne said. “I am proud of how close we were in matches against Great Britain and Argentina. It was not a walkover. The fighting in the last match, coming back it shows the new Indian women’s team. They never gave up and it is something that has changed over the years.”
AN OFFICIAL SAID THE SURVIVORS WERE PEOPLE WHO STEPPED OUT WHILE WAITING FOR THE ROAD TO CLEAR UP, AND WERE LIKELY SAVED AS THEY TOOK SHELTER
vehicles are typically used as shared taxis in these areas.
The official quoted above said the survivors were people who stepped out while waiting for the road to clear up, and were likely saved as they took shelter under a large rocky portion of the mountainside jutting out right above them.
“Some of them managed to leave their vehicles and were running back on the narrow road when the landslide came. They found safe space below rock and boulders,” the officer said, citing eyewitnesses.
An official said rescue work was treacherous amid heavy rain and the possibility that the digging machines could strike people buried in the landslide. “We had to be careful. Use of heavy machinery could have caused casualties,” said the deputy commissioner, who was among the first senior officers to reach the spot.
Lahaul-spiti and Kinnaur were the worst hit districts this season with 13 landslides and 11 flashfloods, four of them triggered by cloudburst incidents, which officials said was an unusual frequency.
Earlier in the week, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said extreme rainfall events in south Asia has increased in recent past and said such events are likely to increase in high altitudes and decrease in sub-tropics.