FIH Pro League losses indicate Indian hockey’s problems go beyond the scoreline

Indian hockey's recent FIH Pro League losses reveal deeper fitness and performance issues beyond just the scoreline.

Four games, four losses, each worse than the previous one, at a venue that had been hitherto impenetrable, a fortress unconquered. Even by Indian hockey’s traditionally slow starting standards, this was a beginning to a crucial year that Craig Fulton and his boys would not have anticipated.

The Indian men’s hockey team played its first four – and only – home matches for 2026 at the Birsa Munda Stadium in Rourkela, a city that, once again, didn’t disappoint when it came to supporting the sport, turning out in full strength night after night, even for non-India matches, despite the disappointing results.

On field, however, it was a different story and the scoreline was only one part of it, perhaps the smallest one. For, what unfolded in the middle was nothing short of a horror show with and without the stick. “Home defeats always hurt more because there’s an expectation. We want to win. We did not go out tonight, or last night, or the game before that, or the game before that, not to win. That’s where the expectation and the frustration is real. (But) judge us on the big tournaments,” Fulton said after the 4-2 loss to Argentina on Sunday (February 15) night.

It was almost a desperate cry from the usually stoic and controlled South African to not judge him and his players in a hurry, to give them time. In his defence, the team has been in similar situations before and come out of it. The difference this time, however, is the limited time they have before the calls for action get louder than they already are. The World Cup — where India hasn’t made the semifinals since its lone triumph in 1975 — is in six months, the Asian Games with a ticket to LA28 at stake three weeks later. In between, there will only be the Pro League and possibly a four-nation competition, featuring New Zealand and Australia in Malaysia, to finalise the squads and combinations, address the concerns, work out the chinks and be in the right mental space.

“Judge us when everything is in sync. I do not want to be here, trust me, right where we are in terms of the results. But I do see the big picture. I see where we are now but I can see the pieces falling in place,” Fulton insisted. Belgium coach Shane McLeod insists that the world only sees 60 minutes of play; only the team knows what goes on on the inside for 23 hours, as it should be.

So it would be wise to leave the tactical, technical details to those who know best. But Fulton’s problems are augmented by the fact that the team has appeared a clueless gathering of switched-off automatons, unaware and unaffected by everything happening around even in those 60 minutes that the world gets to see. Everything has been in tatters – body, basics, mind, attitude. The first two should be easily fixed; the third hopefully with the arrival of Paddy Upton closer to the World Cup. The last needs urgent attention.