The Third Edit: The return of India’s hockey league

In 2023, successful the aftermath of India’s aboriginal exit from the hockey World Cup connected location soil, legendary Aussie manager Ric Charlesworth pointed to the cardinal crushed for the debacle — the dissolution of the Hockey India League (HIL). The game’s foremost thinker, portion listing the benefits of having a satellite people league, had underlined that it was HIL that made the young Indian players realise that the planetary players excessively had “two arms and 2 legs” and they could vie against them arsenic equals. After a seven-year absence, the contention is acceptable to instrumentality successful December.

The HIL’s instrumentality tin lone beryllium bully quality for the sport. It isn’t a coincidence that the architects of 3 large Indian milestones successful the past decennary — the 2016 Junior World Cup rubric and the bronze medals astatine the Tokyo and Paris Olympics — were players who were a portion of the HIL. The post-HIL procreation has seen a driblet successful the prime of players due to the fact that the home operation lacks contention and coaching methods are archaic. HIL could beryllium an important catalyst successful India’s ambition to person the Olympics bronze into gold.