DOHA, 14 December 2006 — Oman stands out in the 10-team men’s hockey roster as the only side from Arab Asia entered in the event. The rest of the teams are steeped in hockey tradition including erstwhile world and Olympic powers India and Pakistan.
This is the first time Oman competed in men’s hockey in the Asian Games. Hockey is the second important sports in Oman after football. There are 16 local hockey clubs in the tiny Gulf state.
“As it is the first time for Oman to play hockey at this level, it is still to be competitive as a team and needs more professional training in order to be able to compete against countries like Korea and China,” said Omani journalist Khalid Al-Wahibi, who is here covering the Asian Games.
Oman wound up 10th after they lost the men’s classification 9th-10th match against Bangladesh. “I wish that the other Gulf countries would play this game so that we could practice with them through Gulf hockey championships,” he said.
Hockey is an old sport introduced in early 1800. According to Al-Wahibi, the Omani team play hockey in much the same way as India and Pakistan although they further developed their techniques by joining European competitions.
An Omani player flew into a rage and beat up his opponents with the stick after swearing and name-calling from the Bangladeshis at the end of the match that ended 5-3 in Bangladesh’s favor. He understood Bengali language and reacted the way he did to trigger the fight, said Al-Wahibi.
According to him, this was not the only reason for the melee as the referees appeared to be biased against the Omani team. The Pakistani referee made one of the major Omani players leave the match for 13 minutes when the score was 2-1 for Oman and made him join the team back with the score 2-2. He also gave the Bangladeshi team three penalty shots.
The Indian hockey team manager, Hardeep Dhillon, thinks that Oman’s participation in hockey is an encouraging start for them to develop and add to their experience.
“They have the basic skills of hockey and are physically in shape for the game. They only need more international exposure and to participate in more championships on and international basis,” he says.
Dhillon was disappointed from the Indian results in this men’s game since it was the top team in hockey for a long time. “It was a matter of bad luck, lack of concentration and lapses in the defense in the Indian team,” he said. “This year, Korea and Pakistan are the strongest hockey teams.”
The Indian women’s hockey team reached better results than the men’s team winning the bronze medal against Korea.
Korea’s performance went according to the formbook as their men’s hockey team reached the gold medal match against China. In the last 20 years, the Korean men’s hockey team won the gold three times in 1986 in Seoul, 1994 in Hiroshima and 2002 in Busan. Korea’s women’s hockey team got golds at four Asian Games in a row, from 1986 until 1998. In Busan 2002, Korea got the silver medal.
“I expect the Korean men’s team to win the gold medal this year as it did in Busan 2002,” said Cho Sung Kun, men’s hockey team manager.
In the men’s hockey world ranking, Korea are sixth and India seventh. The women’s world ranking has Korea in ninth and India 13th .
In the Asian Games ranking, Korea are the third best and India sixth.
