Sabir Hussain/New Delhi

Once called the nursery of Indian hockey, Bhopal had been adrift for a few decades now before it began to script a turnaround late last year under the guidance of former Olympian Mohammad Sameer Dad.

It was in June 2021 that 43-year-old Dad took charge of the Madhya Pradesh Hockey Academy as the head coach and by October the sub-junior and junior teams of the academy had won the inaugural national championships for hockey academies. 

Dad, an Air India employee who is on deputation to the MP Hockey Academy, acknowledges that he himself was surprised by the performance of the sub-junior team.

“Our ground was under repair and so we had to practice at the Sports Authority of India’s ground. But they had their own practice sessions and we were given the slot between 9 am to 3 pm. The boys put their heart and soul into the training and that became evident when the championship started. I did have reservations about the team progressing much into the tournament and many others told me that my boys stood no chance,” Dad told Awaz-The Voice.

Against all odds, Dad’s boys beat a much-fancied Haryana Hockey Academy team 6-2 in the opening match, and then they became unstoppable.

Sameer Dad (in dark glasses) with the MP Hockey Academy sub-junior team which won the national championship. 

“This generation is very confident of itself. Once they defeated Haryana, their confidence just soared and the momentum carried them through. In the final, we were up against Odisha Naval Tata Hockey High-Performance Centre who fought back to tie the 3-3 at end of regulation time. But my boys kept their cool and won the shootout 3-1,” says Dad who played his last match for India in 2003.

What made the sub-junior triumph particularly sweet was that his 14-year-old son Konain who plays as a winger was part of the winning team. “He scored two goals in the match against Haryana and another goal in another match.”

The sub-junior team’s triumph came on October 13, 2021. Two weeks later on October 27, it was a double delight for the coach when the MP Hockey Academy also won the championship in the junior category defeating Raja Karan Hockey academy 3-1 in the final.

“It was such an overwhelming feeling for me as a coach to help Madhya Pradesh Hockey Academy bag two titles in the inaugural edition of the tournament. This will be a morale booster for us and will motivate us to produce more quality players for India,” he says.

Dad, who debuted as a forward for the Indian senior team in 1998, was a member of the gold medal-winning side at the Asian Games that year after a gap of 32 years. He went on to play in the World Cup in the same year and in the Sydney Olympics in 2000 where he scored two goals. An injury in 2003 eventually ended his India career although he kept playing in the domestic circuit.  When he finally hung up his boots as a player, he took up coaching and was an assistant coach for the national team in the Junior World Cup in 2016 at Lucknow which India won.

Sameer Dad comes from a family with strong links to hockey.

So what is it that he loves about coaching?

“I pass on the skills – both old and new - to the youngsters. I come from a family that has long been associated with hockey and coaching is my way of giving back to the sport that I love so much.”  

In a country where cricket overshadows every other sport, Dad said there was no point competing against cricket but hockey was doing pretty well for itself and his academy’s success could once again draw many boys to the game in Bhopal.

He insists that the boys must get their basics right.

“The one who clicks at the given moment gets ahead and so basic training is very important. Ninety per cent of hockey is all about the basics like how to trap a ball, dribble and dodge, how to pass the ball on the move, and how to receive a pass. Strength training is a natural corollary. We have a gym and trainers and I expect the boys to shape up well,” he said.

He is quite happy with the facilities at the academy where a total of 43 boys train in the junior and sub-junior divisions. 

“The government is backing this academy solidly. Madhya Pradesh Sports Minister Yashodhara Raje Scindia is very passionate about the hockey academy in particular and sports in general. The hockey academy itself is a state-of-the-art thing.”

Bhopal’s standing in Indian hockey had long fallen by the wayside and Dad says it was largely because of infighting among hockey officials and their lack of foresight.

“But it is possible for Bhopal to start producing quality players once again. Vivek Sagar Prasad who was part of the bronze medal-winning team at the Tokyo Olympics had trained in our academy for three years. Neelakanta Sharma, another member of the Tokyo Olympic squad also trained here and so did Arman Qureshi who was part of the 2016 junior World Cup-winning team,” Dad says.

Once a player does well, the doors open to a better future as they are offered jobs in government departments, and many players who had trained at the MP Hockey Academy now play as professionals in India’s leading clubs.

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The former Olympian is confident that India can regain its earlier status as an all-conquering team.

“Indian hockey has improved a lot in recent years. If this progress continues, we can easily be the most dominant side in the world. At the very least, we can be in the top four,” Dad says.