India Hosts Hockey World Cup 2018 – Odisha (India’s Best Kept Secret) #HockeyWorldCup2018

Hockey World Cup 2018 – Odisha (India’s Best Kept Secret)

The nation is all set and geared up to host Hockey’s biggest ever event, Hockey World Cup 2018. It is the 14th edition of this Men’s Hockey tournament and India. It is for the third time India will be hosting Hockey World Cup. First, it was Bombay in 1982, New Delhi in 2010 and Odisha in 2018. The tournament will be held for 18 days, there are 16 teams pooled into 4 groups each. Australia is the defending champions, they won twice in fact.

Winning the New Delhi 2010 and The Hague 2014. Kookaburras will be hungry to make it a hattrick no team has ever done in the history of the tournament. In the 13 times, Pakistan leads the tally with 4 titles, Netherlands & Australia with 3 titles, Germany with 2 titles and India with only 1 title. The last time India won Hockey World Cup was way back in 1975 – Malaysia. The story has been completely different since then.

After the 1975 final victory to date, it has been forgettable memory for Team India.

We have never made it to the semifinals in the last 10 tournaments. Whereas Pakistan has performed extremely well winning the tournament four times and runner-up twice. But both India and Pakistan have lost their strength in the last two decades and are nowhere in comparison to the top teams like Netherlands, Germany, and Australia. But always history can be rewritten and I, as an optimistic Indian would want India to reach the finals that will be played on 16th December at the Kalinga Stadium Bhubaneswar.

Hockey has lost the charm and importance that it was receiving in the early days of the game. In the 1950s to 1970s India was a lethal team in Hockey and we have great players who have become World Hockey Legends. But the Indian performance chart had continuously seen the negative trend and was never in condition to go up. It’s the same story with Football which is also picking up the positive trend lately. 

Indian hockey is seeing major improvements in the game.

We have seen great victories for the Indian team in the last two years building up to this mega event. India performed well in the Hockey World League Semi-Finals and Finals. So we are truly on a growth trend again and we will reach the lost heights of Indian hockey very soon. It’s our Game and Indians are slowly understanding this point. We have seen the movies made on Hockey in India, Soorma and Gold. Soorma and Gold clearly depict the heroes of Indian hockey and how unconditional was their love for the game of Hockey.

I feel Indian Hockey Team needs more and more support like the way it has received today during the opening ceremony. Kalinga Stadium was roaring in support of Indian Team captain Manpreet Singh. CM Naveen Patnaik shared beautiful insights and called for the tournament to begin. He was the Chief Minister who has closely watched the preparations for the tournament and organized an amazing and fantastic opening ceremony which had a deep concept for the people to understand.

I really hope that this Hockey World Cup will bring the lost value of our Nation Sport back to the country and we shall many more Indians playing Hockey and one day our dream of Olympic Gold comes true! For all this, the Indian Team and the players need all of our support! #JaiHind #India

AR Rehman gave this beautiful, rich, cultural theme song for Hockey World Cup 2018!

Published by Sriram

A Teacher trying to Learn new things and explore the world each day! Believe in Happiness by the virtue of sacrifice and forgiveness.

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