Chennai, September 5
Indian Hockey Federation president K.P.S Gill is in news for wrong reasons once again for his controversial carrot and stick of rewarding each goal scored and penalising each goal conceded at the Asia Cup, a move that has come under attack from various quarters.

Gill said he wanted to appreciate players’ consistent performance by giving them bonus but also wanted them to understand the “importance of defending our goalpost”.

“When we beat Sri Lanka 20-0, I decided to pay Rs 1,000 per goal to the whole team and not only to the goal scorers. The team will be getting Rs 30,000 for their 30 goals scored in four matches so far,” said Gill.

“Our team has been consistently yielding goals in the first five minutes in the tournaments for a long time. We wanted to extend something as token of appreciation for the players,” he said.

On the decision to penalise the players for goals conceded in the ongoing tournament, Gill said “giving soft goals to rival teams has doomed our chances.

The IHF chief’s move has, however, drawn criticism from former players.

“This is a disgraceful scheme. It shows that the federation officials do not understand anything,” former captain Zafar Iqbal said.

Ex-player and coach M.K. Kaushik said the decision defied logic.

“I think the team should be rewarded of their good performances just as they do in cricket. But this plan of imposing penalties is beyond my understanding,” he said.

Gill, however, termed it an “internal matter” between the IHF and the players and said, “Deduction of money from players may or may not be applied but this small amount as token bonus will be paid to the team at the end of the Asia Cup,” he said.

“In Doha Asian Games, the soft goals yielded by us cost us an Olympic berth. Therefore, it was felt the players should also understand the importance of scoring goals and defending our goal from falling,” he added. — PTI