The dust has seemingly not yet settled on Roelant Oltmans' ouster as coach of the Indian men's hockey team but Hockey India threw up another surprise by appointing Sjoerd Marijne as the new coach. Marijne had been serving as the coach of the Indian women's team for the past six months and in his place Harendra Singh, coach of the junior World Cup winning men's team has been appointed. Indeed in the space of a week, Hockey India has managed to upset the functioning of two national teams. While HI must be convinced of the wisdom of their decision, there seem to be several question marks over the bizarre happenings of the past three days.
Was this a hasty decision?
When HI made the decision to sack Oltmans last week, they invited applications for his replacement. The deadline for submission of applications was September 15 and the tenure was to run till the end of 2020, encapsulating the Tokyo Olympics as well. However, with the appointment of Marijne, six days before the close of their deadline, HI has quietly withdrawn the advertisement.
While it is known that Harendra had sent in his application, less is known about who else might have pitched for the position. Even Marijne's application seems strange, for he was a serving coach with the Indian women's team when he apparently pitched for a new role. However, Elena Norman, the CEO of Hockey India, dismissed any claims of impropriety. "He can be assigned other duties," Norman told ESPN.
What was Marijne's track record before this appointment?
One of the reasons given for firing Oltmans was the Indian team's poor run of form recently. The team's sixth-place finish in the Hockey World League semifinals was apparently the last straw. However, Oltmans might feel hard done considering the recent performance of his replacement. The Indian women's team has done comparatively worse. At the Hockey World League semifinals in South Africa, the women's team under Marijne finished eighth out of ten sides.
Unlike the men's team who qualify for the World League finals by virtue of being hosts, the women's team will not feature in the World League finals to be played in Auckland. Even overlooking the women's hockey team's performance, the choice to appoint Marijne is particularly astounding as he has never coached a senior men's international team.
So why was Marijne selected?
High-performance director and interim chief coach David John told ESPN that the decision was taken keeping the Asia Cup in mind. "It was important we made a quick decision since both the men's and women's teams have tournaments coming up shortly," he said. "So we didn't want to destabilize the teams too much and also it was necessary to give the coaches enough time to learn about the players."
The men's Asia Cup will be held from October 11 to 22. John's logic doesn't hold well to scrutiny. Marijne told ESPN his first task as coach of the Indian men's team would be getting to know the players."I want to first talk to the players," Marijne says. "And get to know how they've been doing over the last couple of months."
Is there a money angle?
Perhaps the only positive that can be taken from this scenario is perhaps a financial one. Roelant Oltmans' contract was for $15000 per month. Marijne, on the other hand, was being paid half that sum and will continue to draw that amount even as coach of the men's team.
Harendra is a serving officer in Air India. As such, he will not draw a salary as coach of the women's junior team but only be paid a travel and daily allowance in additional to a consultancy fee. However, in the current context, this saving might turn out to be a case of HI being penny wise and pound foolish.
What happens to Harendra?
While Marijne might be inexperienced, in Harendra, HI already had a coach who understood the Indian players well. 11 of the 33 players in the core probables for the men's senior team were members of the Indian Junior team was coached by Harendra to a World Cup gold medal. But Harendra will have no role with them.
He had strangely been removed from his responsibility as the junior team coach earlier this year and his return to the national set up as coach of the senior team seemed logical in the wake of Oltmans' dismissal. However Singh, is being brought back to work with a team he has no prior experience with.
The mystery of the minister's announcement
Much can be discerned by how Marijne's name was revealed. The announcement of Marijne's appointment as the new coach of the Indian hockey team was not made by any Hockey India official but on the twitter handle of Rajyavardhan Rathore, who had taken charge as sports minster at the beginning of the week. "I would like to thank the Hon'ble minister of state for youth affairs and sports Mr. Rajyavardhan Rathore for his swift action on appointing the new chief coach for the Indian men's team," Mohammad Mushtaq Ahmed, secretary general of HI stated in a press release.
Where does this leave women's hockey?
While the concern over Indian men's hockey is understandable, equally troubling is the uncertainty that has been cast over the women's team. The team's performance had improved significantly over the past couple of years, even as they won the Asian Champions Trophy in 2016 and subsequently qualified for the Olympics for the first time since 1980. While the team under Marijne had a poor tournament, the result could be understood as the team got used to a new coach, especially one who had enjoyed some amount of success prior to his arrival in India.
However, for no fault of their own, they will have to adapt to a new coach - one with little experience in the women's game. With the Indian team yet to qualify for the 2018 World Cup, and two high profile tournaments in the Commonwealth Games and Asian Games, it remains to be seen who will shoulder the responsibility for India's performance next year.