Game on for seniors after juniors win Asia Cup

New Delhi, June 13

Senior India hockey players cannot take their place in the side for the upcoming Asian Games for granted after the success of the junior women’s team in the Asia Cup in Japan recently, chief coach Janneke Schopman said. The junior women’s team returned to Bengaluru today after displaying superb skills in their win over four-time champions South Korea 2-1 in the summit clash to clinch their maiden Asia Cup title in Kakamigahara, Japan, on Sunday.

The Dutch tactician also said that while senior India players were “quite competitive”, the age of junior players will not come in the way of their selection for the Hangzhou Asian Games.

“I was able to see everyone off the field and on the field and their performances. Let’s see what happens but the senior core group is quite competitive and people have to show up in every session to get selected,” said Schopman, who coached the junior Asia Cup side.

“Age is not the deciding factor (for team selection for the Asian Games) and we winning the junior Asia Cup means players showed up, so I (I’ll) definitely take that into consideration. I am quite happy with the performance of the players and the thing for me was always to use the Australia tour and junior Asia Cup to have 25 out of our 33 players (in core probables) performing,” she added.