Kolkata: India’s premier hockey goalkeeper PR Sreejesh will miss out on the Asia Cup in Dhaka in October this year after he had a knee surgery which would keep him away from the game for atleast five months.
He suffered a ligament tear in his right knee during the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup this year in April-May and his knee was operated in Mumbai earlier this month. The Indian team badly missed his services in the recently concluded Hockey World League Semi-final in London.
David John, the High Performance Director of India Hockey said that the star Indian goalie would take up at least five months to regain full fitness after which he might just be able to participate in the Hockey World League Final which would be held in Bhuvneshwar in December this year.
He said, “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,” added John.
He also 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.”
As the High Performance Director of the team, John has made a careful analysis of the poor show the Indians put up in the Hockey World League Semi-final in London.
“We need to work on our defence. We need to find some faster defenders because in London we were caught in counter attacks by Malaysia and Canada for lack of speed,” said John.
He further added, “We also need to work on our conversions. Throughout the tournament we had far more opportunities in and around opposition circle, we had far more chances. We had high number of circle penetrations. We need to improve our efficiency in scoring.”
John further pointed out that this could be the end of the road for VR Raghunath when he called for a need to have faster defenders in the team.
He said, “Raghu is not the fastest and as I said speed in defence is a big problem for us. We had left out Raghu from the last core probables list but a new list will be made soon after the Senior Nationals. But at present Rupinder (Pal Singh) and Harmanpreet (Singh) are a good battery.”
But at the same time, he made it clear that there wouldn’t be any drastic changes in the structure of the team and the support staff following the dismal performance in London.
The Australian also said that just like all the other tournaments, a review meeting would be held where the players’ performances would be put under the scanner. The meeting would include the coaches along with head coach Roelant Oltmans who would have to answer some really tough questions.
Said John, “We will have a review meeting next week after we receive the coach’s report, which generally comes within 48 hours. It’s a routine exercise which is held after every tournament. But definitely some tough questions will be asked.”
“(But) I don’t think there is going to be any changes because a team needs stability over a period of time,” he added further.
Oltmans, however wouldn’t be able to attend the meeting as he would go to The Netherlands straight from London for a break. The players too would enjoy a short break before they join each other at the national camp on July 12.