In hockey hotbed Odisha, players struggle for turf
CRUNCH State hosting top international events has failed to provide infrastructure to its own players
BHUBANESWAR: His hockey kit slung from his shoulder, Shakti Khujoor, a player with the Gangpur-odisha junior team, and his friends from the sports hostel looked yearningly at the Naval Tata Hockey Academy (NTHA) girls train on the second pitch of the Kalinga Stadium complex here.
“Looks like we won’t get to play today again. Let’s go play football,” Khujoor said to his dozen hostel mates who were waiting to practice but instead proceeded to the adjacent football ground.
For half-a-year, this has been the story of Khujoor and the 59 other national-level hockey players of the sports hostel—a struggle to find some playing time on the artificial turf. At a time when Bhubaneswar has not j ust become the centre of Indian but world hockey—with the Odisha capital set to become the first city to host back-to-back World Cups (2018 and 2023)—its own state players can’t find a place to play.
The Kalinga Stadium is the pride of Indian hockey right now, having hosted several top tournaments like the Champions Trophy, World League, Olympic qualifiers among others. Owned by the Sports and Youth Services Department of the Government of Odisha, the Kalinga Stadium complex is similar to a Sports Authority of India (SAI) facility. It has one multipurpose stadium—which hosted the 2017 Asian Athletics Championships and is home to Indian Super League (ISL) outfit Odisha FC— along with another athleticscum-football practice facility, two hockey turfs apart from arenas for tennis, swimming, basketball among other sports.
Odisha has been promoting the sport with plans to install 17 artificial turfs in the hockey hotbed of Sundergarh district and the NTHA, a private high performance academy set up last year in partnership with the government, which provides NTHA with infrastructure.
But the NTHA, which currently houses 25 girls, has been given the second hockey turf in the complex, depriving Odisha’s players from using it. The main turf has been occupied since October by the Indian national team, who will also play their upcoming Pro League matches against world champions Belgium and world No.2 Australia here later this month.
“Earlier if the second pitch was busy then we would practice on the main one inside the stadium. But now the Indian team is practicing there,” says Khujoor’s hostel mate Biju Ekka, who plays for Gangpur-odisha’s senior team. “We can only practice when the NTHA girls are not training and they usually train in the morning and evening. That leaves us with no choice but to train in the heat of the afternoon or during meal times. Also, many times when we practice there’s no water left and the turf dries up.”
A hockey pitch must be regularly irrigated as a wet pitch allows better quality and speed of play, enabling players to get their sticks under the ball. It also prevents the ball from bouncing which can hurt players.
“Because of these issues we cannot practice two or three times a week. The number goes up to four at times,” says Bishal Minz, Ekka’s Gangpur-odisha teammate.
The sports hostel women are a bit luckier. Since the NTHA in Bhubaneswar is only a girls’ academy as of now, they often play and train with their counterparts from the hostel.
“Yes we still get to play but the boys are not so lucky,” said a woman player from the GangpurOdisha senior team who did not want to be identified.
Odisha Sports Minister Tusharkanti Behera dismissed that there was any issue.
“Anytime they can go (and play),” Behera said. “Once in a while there might be a problem but they are getting enough time.”
At the recently concluded senior national championships in Jhansi, neither Odisha nor Gangpur-odisha made the quarter-finals—the players said lack of practice time was a key reason.
In addition, the players are also deprived of gym access inside the stadium. With the Indian hockey team, Odisha FC and several other national and state athletes training at the complex, the hockey players are left out. “There are three football teams (based) here which leaves us no time for the gym. We have had to change our timings. The boys try to work out after practice but that becomes difficult,” said sports department hockey coach Kalu Charan Choudhury.
Apart from turf and gym issues, the hockey players also have to deal with lack of equipment if it gets lost or broken. The players receive equipment only once a year and if someone breaks his stick, he has to either spend from his pocket or wait for a whole year to get another.
The sanctioning of equipment also takes time, at times years.
“We have been requesting for all protective equipment like face masks and guards used during penalty corners since 2017. But nobody is putting a tender for it hence we are not receiving it,” said Choudhury, who has been coaching since 1988. “There are times when we are not left with balls after the allotted ones get used or lost. But training must go on so we then request sponsors to donate a few.”
Choudhury, who says he has coached as many as 35 internationals including former India captain Dilip Tirkey and Lazarus Barla, has urged former internationals from the state to “reach out to these kids and ask them about their problems”.