Sreejesh out for 5 months, to miss Asia Cup in Dhaka
India’s numero uno hockey goalkeeper PR Sreejesh will be out of action for at least five months following a knee surgery, which effectively means he will miss the Asia Cup to be held in Dhaka in October this year.
Sreejesh, who was badly missed by the team in the justconcluded Hockey World League Semi-Final in London, went under the knife earlier this month in Mumbai after he sustained a ligament tear in his right knee during the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup in April-May this year.
According to India hockey’s High Performance Director David John, Sreejesh will take at least five months to return to full fitness, which means he has a bright chance of playing in the year-ending Hockey World League Final, to be held in Bhubaneswar in December.
“We missed Sreejesh badly. Vikas Dahiya and Akash Chikte are young and they are no match for top goalkeepers of the world. We need to develop our second line of keepers in the next six months.
“Sreejesh is out of action. He underwent a surgery under Dr Anant Joshi 10 days back in Mumbai and he will need at least 5 to 6 months to return to full fitness,” John said.
“Sreejesh will definitely miss the Asia Cup but we will try our best to make him fully fit before the all-important Hockey World League Final in December. But it also give us time to work with and develop our reserve keepers,” he said.
The Indian men and women missed out on the podium by a whisker as they finished fourth in both the categories at the World Team Chess Championships here.
The last round went well for both Indian men and women as they scored fine victories over Norway and Azerbaijan, respectively.
However, the men lost the penultimate round encounter against Russia by 1.5-2.5 that cost them a medal.
The women were quite lucky to win the penultimate round encounter against Vietnam as both D Harika and Tania Sachdev fought back from nearly lost positions to save the day for their side.
India shooters continued their fine show and won a bronze medal in men’s 25m rapid fire pistol team event at the ISSF Junior World Championship Rifle/Pistol in Suhl, Germany on Monday.
The trio of Anish, Anhad Jawanda and Shivam Shukla notched up a combined score of 1711 to claim third place and take India’s overall tally from the competition to two gold, one silver and one bronze medal. This was Anish’s second medal after having won the 25m standard pistol gold on the opening day of the competition.