India’s FIH Women’s Olympic Qualifiers Overview, Schedule, Squad And Telecast Details: Hosts India get ready to take on world number 13 USA as the home side look to move onto the upcoming Tokyo Olympics.
Sitting on the cusp of affirming themselves of a spot in the Tokyo Olympics, the Indian women’s hockey team is ensuring that it leaves no stone unturned in a bid to punch above their weight and outshine USA when the two sides meet on Friday and Saturday. The final hurdle infront of India ahead of the forthcoming showpiece games sees them take on the world number 13 side, an outfit they’ll be well aware of easing past across the two rounds of matches.
The side are coming into these pivotal fixtures in the wake of having tasted consummate success, first in the FIH Series Finals in Japan and then in England were the side were defeated just once. This is a side which is a staunch and stellar side, one filled with stalwart performers who have been responsible for the side’s rampant ascendancy in the fraternity and would be looking to top off a rousing year with qualification to the Olympics.
“Our focus is clearly on our game. Yes, you should know the strengths and weaknesses of your opponent but not be obsessed with it so much that you forget your own game! Having said that, when you do well against a team, there is greater confidence of doing so again,” Indian captain Rani Rampal said.
“We have retained the 18-member team from our preparatory tour of England. We have a good balance of players and, keeping in mind our objective of qualifying for the Tokyo Olympics 2020, I feel it is important to stay in the rhythm with the same players who performed well on the preparatory tour. We now focus on making sure that we leave no stone unturned when we take on USA,” Marijne said when talking about the identity of the tea selected by the country.
The USA team had arrived in India 10 days prior to the first qualifier in a bid to tune their squad and combination and acclimatise themselves with the conditions prevelant. Last meeting India in the Women’s World Cup in 2018 when the two sides had ended level at 1-1, the side’s captain Sharkey said, “Our goal is obviously to qualify for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. We want to put forth our best in those two games and make sure we play to our potential against India.”
USA’s Coach Janneke Schopm further added on the side’s agenda on how to approach the encounters, “We are well-prepared for the Indian team. They have progressed well over the past year and so have we. We have been following India matches lately. We are expecting close matches and our team is very excited to be here.”
India’s FIH Olympic Qualifiers Hockey Team Squad
Savita (VC), Rajani, Deep, Gurjit Kaur, Reena Khokhar, Salima, Sushila, Nikki Pradhan, Monika, Neha Goyal, Lilima, Namita, Rani Rampal(C), Vandana Katariya, Navneet Kaur, Lalremsiami, Navjot Kaur, Sharmila
Indian coach Sjoerd Marijne spoke about his side’s preparations and elaborated on how the team was getting underway for the matches, “The way I have experienced the crowd in Bhubaneswar, they are very supportive. But it is about how to deal with the moment and it is very hard to train for that. The England tour was important because it helped the girls stay in rhythm, else we would not have played for 3-4 months which is too much.”
Format
The format for making it into the qualifiers was reconceptualised by the governing council in a bid to make the game as expansive as plausible, seeing a total of 14 sides taking part in the process. The first batch of matches were played across October 25-27 while the final round of contestants will be played on November 1-2.
The 14 sides were paired up against each other back in September with each round of qualifiers featuring two matches against the sides drawn up against each other. The side with the better magnitude of score across these two encounters will seal its berth into the Olympics 2020. In the eventuality of both the teams being level after the two encounters, penalties will proceeded to decide which team progresses through.
Teams Who Have Qualified For The Tokyo Olympics 2020
Japan, Argentina, South Africa, Netherlands, New Zealand, Spain, China and Australia.
India’s FIH Olympic Schedule
Tickets for both the matches are currently available of Hockey India’s website, https://www.hockeyindia.org/ starting from Rs.200 and rising to R.500.
Match Details
Qualifier 1
Match: India Vs USA
Date And Time: 1st November, Friday- 6:00pm IST
Venue: Kalinga Stadium, Bhubaneswar
Television: Star Sports 1/HD
Match Details
Qualifier 2
Match: India Vs USA
Date And Time: 2nd November, Saturday- 6:00pm IST
Venue: Kalinga Stadium, Bhubaneswar
Television: Star Sports 1/HD
