Craig Fulton comes as the males’s chief coach at a vital time for Indian hockey and may have his first check throughout the upcoming European leg of the Pro League beginning in 10 days. But the South African, in his first interplay with the media, appeared clear in his imaginative and prescient.
“The priority is to qualify directly for Paris (Olympics) by winning the Asian Games and using the Pro League and the Asian Champions Trophy to try and set us up as strong as possible for that,” he informed choose media on Tuesday, including that there have been additionally plans to have extra European excursions to guarantee consistent aggressive publicity.
In cost for simply over two weeks, Fulton already appears to have figured India’s largest hurdle to be extra psychological than bodily. “I think India is a very exciting team, full of talent and flair, and very difficult to play against at home.
“The challenge is how consistently successful we can be away. Almost all major tournaments in the next two-year cycle are outside India and the objective is to be consistent away from home,” he defined.
Need to be composed
Talking about the staff’s strengths and weaknesses, Fulton mentioned, “What I want to focus on is our ‘defend to win’ attitude so that we can play to our strengths. That means turning over the ball and being able to counter-attack because that’s what India is fantastic at, the ability to intercept and move the ball and play aggressively into opposition space. We want to harness the DNA of the team which is fast, skilful, connected, strong in set pieces and penalty corner defence, fantastic goalkeepers.
“What I would like to work on is from a composure point of view — that when we are under real pressure, everyone is calm and confident and knows what to do and play ourselves out of difficult situations and be composed enough to do it.”
Former coach Graham Reid had spoken in related phrases, indicating the want for a psychological coach and Fulton revealed the federation was in talks for one. “I have been in conversation to try to secure the services of a specialist, this is definitely a priority and we are working out something,” he acknowledged.
Admitting that getting a steadiness of youth and expertise was vital, Fulton harassed he would be maintaining a tally of the home expertise past the nationwide camp. “You are always on the lookout for young talent and then how to bring it in. Domestic hockey yes, I am in touch with David John, he’s involved at that level but I think the step before that is to focus on the Under-21 block of players. We play three games against the juniors now and there is some real talent in that squad. They have their Asia Cup and I will be keeping an eye on that,” he mentioned.
With the Asian Games in lower than 4 months, Fulton was hopeful the staff might go all the means at the occasion but declared that, finally, it was up to the gamers to step up whereas captain Harmanpreet Singh refuted any speak of complacency submit the Olympic bronze. “We spend almost the entire year in camps only to get better. There is no comfort zone for a professional athlete,” he declared.
Fulton signed off with what could properly be the new motto of the staff: Start robust but end stronger.
