Indian men’s hockey team’s national camp ahead of their FIH Pro League tie against Argentina will start on Saturday at the Sports Authority of India (SAI)’s southern centre near Bengaluru, Hockey India said on Friday.
A 33-member core probables group has been called up for the 18-day camp which ends on March 31 after which the team departs to Buenos Aires, Argentina, where the two-match tie will be played on April 10 and 11.
“The team was given a brief three-day break to go meet their families before they return to the national camp on Saturday. I think this break was needed to refresh mentally as the upcoming weeks are going to be quite intense as we prepare for the FIH Hockey Pro League matches against Argentina,” said chief coach Graham Reid.
“We are looking forward to resuming our campaign in the FIH Hockey Pro League. Getting good competition in Europe was certainly very important ahead of the Pro League matches. We were in good nick when we played Netherlands, Belgium and Australia last year and we want to bring our ‘A’ game to the fore in the upcoming matches,” said Reid.
33-member probables Group:
Goalkeepers: PR Sreejesh, Krishan B Pathak and Suraj Karkera,
Defenders: Birendra Lakra, Rupinder Pal Singh, Surender Kumar, Amit Rohidas, Kothajit Singh Khadangbam, Harmanpreet Singh, Gurinder Singh, Jarmanpreet Singh, Varun Kumar, Dipsan Tirkey, Nilam Sanjeep Xess.
Midfielders: Manpreet Singh, Chinglensana Singh Kangujam, Nilakanta Sharma, Sumit, Jaskaran Singh, Rajkumar Pal, Hardik Singh, Vivek Sagar Prasad.
Forwards: SV Sunil, Akashdeep Singh, Mandeep Singh, Lalit Upadhyay, Ramandeep Singh, Simranjeet Singh, Shamsher Singh, Gurjant Singh, Dilpreet Singh, Gursahibjit Singh and Shilanand Lakra
