The Men’s Field Hockey Tournament at the 2012 Summer Olympics (@London2012) in London will be held over a thirteen day period beginning on 30 July, and culminating with the medal finals on 11 August. All games will be played at the Riverbank Arena, London.
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| Will comfortable match timings get India gold? |
The twelve teams in the tournament are divided into two pools of six teams with each team initially playing round-robin games within their pool. India team into Pool B in which team are Germany, Netherlands, Korea, Belgium and also share pool with Sultan Azlan Shah Cup 2012 (@azlancup) sensational winner New Zealand (@BlackSticks).
Indian Men’s Hockey Team will start London Olympic 2012 Journey from 30 July 2012. Only two time slot given to Indian Men’s Hockey Team achieve to play matches at Olympic and they are 16:00 BST and 13:45 BST(No Claps please !!!! & why I use onlyword, see the example). When I convert 16:00 BST and 13:45 BST to Indian time, it show me 8:30 PM and 5:45 PM in India, which mean need not to adjust sleeping timing for Indian Hockey Players. But if we have look at other teams in pool they have to see some horror movies so that they will not sleep at match time.
For example I took Sultan Azlan Shah Cup 2012 winner New Zealand, they will play game at 08:30 BST, 10:45 BST, 16:00 BST, and 21:15 BST. (Variation in timing)
Now let’s Convert 8:30 BST to New Zealand local time and the answer is 7:30 PM. Now I sure you say so what !! Its normal timing !
My answer is also ‘Yes’ but what for 16:00 BST and 21:15 BST?
For your more help to understand I convert 16:00 BSTto New Zealand local time and it is 3:00 AM (Even Roosters not wake up). No doubt it is really very difficult for New Zealand player to adjust daily schedule. So I think it is great advantage for Indian Hockey Team because our team needs not to adjust timing schedule for sleeping, training and for other practice activity.
The Australia national field hockey team (nickname Kookaburras) men’s coach Ric Charlesworth has already criticised the Olympic match schedule after claiming it disadvantages his side and benefits their major rivals.
Aussi men’s team (@HockeyAustralia) coach Ric Charlesworth said “When you look at the schedule it is patently unfair in our opinion, none of the teams want to play in this early morning time slot. Early games should be fairly distributed between all teams.”
He also added “I don’t expect special treatment, I expect not to be disadvantaged, and out of five matches you may expect one 5am start for our athletes not three.”
So personally I think the timing of match is major and big advantage for Indian Men’s Hockey Team for London Olympic 2012. Where at other Hockey Team’s need to adjust their timing. So if we raise more expectation from Indian Men’s Hockey Team is not totally unfair. We want to see great performance from our team so our race of Olympic finishes with GOLD.
My best wishes always with Indian Hockey Team !!!!!!
#FirDilDoHockeyKo
Hemang Bhavasar
(@hemangbhavasar)
