2020 Hockey Olympic Qualifiers: India should not take Russia lightly, says Manpreet Singh

The World No. 5 Indian Men's Hockey team will be up against World No. 22 Russia in the Olympics qualifiers, scheduled to be played on November 1 and 2 at the Kalinga stadium.

Bhubaneswar: Indian men's hockey team captain Manpreet Singh said that they should not take Russia lightly as both the teams are pulling their socks up to compete in the FIH Hockey Olympic Qualifiers.

The World No. 5 Indian Men's Hockey team will be up against World No. 22 Russia in the Olympics qualifiers, scheduled to be played on November 1 and 2 at the Kalinga stadium.

"First of all, I think we should not underestimate Russia because they are also coming to qualify for the Olympics. They will also give their best," Singh told reporters.

India had a very successful Belgium tour where they won all their five matches, three against Belgium and two against Spain.

Although admitting his side played well in the Belgium tour, Singh said that Russia will try their level best to qualify for the Olympics."Our performance during the Belgium tour was very good and the way we played against Spain and Belgium. The whole team performed well there. But these matches will be to qualify for Olympics and Russia also want to qualify," he said.

Coach Graham Reid reflects on India's performance

The consistency of our performances against Belgium and Spain, and it was good to see that we kept building momentum as the tour progressed. For me, the good takeaways were that our running, effort, speed and intensity was actually even higher than last year's World Cup," Reid said.

The Indian team have been in fine form lately, winning the FIH Men's Series Finals in June, the Tokyo Olympics 2020 Test Event in August, and then winning all five of their matches against World Champions Belgium and world number eight Spain as part of their preparations for the much anticipated Olympic Qualifiers.

Speaking ahead of the announcement of his team for the Qualifiers, Reid said that he is satisfied with the performances his team put in against Belgium and Spain during their preparatory tour, but wants his players to maintain the momentum when they take on world number 22 Russia on November 1 and 2 here at the Kalinga Hockey Stadium.

"We have been in the process of debriefing our Belgium Tour to go back and work out what we did well, what were the things we needed to improve on, and then come up with the objectives that we are going forward within the coming two weeks.

We have almost finished that process and its been a really good exercise for the team, and it is also good for the players that they understand what are the things that they do when they are playing well," Reid said.

Graham Reid is happy with India's performance in Belgium and Spain.

"There were things like good pressure on the ball, good structure and those things were quite evident when we went back to see how we played in Belgium.

We've had a good week here in Bhubaneswar to determine what were the outcomes from that preparatory tour, and now is the time to continue working in that direction," he added.

Reid, who took over as the coach of the Indian team in April 2019, also spoke about the return of some players from injury during their Belgium Tour.

"The players who have been long-term injured returned to the team in Belgium, and I feel it was good for them to get back into the groove of playing consistently at that level.

It was a really good experience for them to be able to play again, and it also gave me an opportunity to see them closely, and now select the best 18-member team for the upcoming FIH Hockey Olympic Qualifiers Odisha," Reid said.