AMRITSAR: India's men's hockey team landed at Amritsar airport on October 6 to drums, garlands and bouquets, two days after the close of an Asian Games at which Indian hockey achieved something it never had before: gold in both the men's and the women's tournaments at the same Games.
Fans, Punjab Hockey Association officials and the players' parents were at the airport, All India Radio reported. Among the players who landed were captain Harmanpreet Singh, Jugraj Singh, Hardik and Manpreet Singh.
The men beat Malaysia 5-1 in the final on October 3 to retain the title they won in 2022. Harmanpreet Singh scored twice, and Jugraj, Hardik and Shilanand scored one goal each. It was India's fifth Asian Games gold in men's hockey, after 1966, 1998, 2014 and 2022.
The men's team, coached by Craig Fulton, goes to Los Angeles as a two-time defending Olympic medallist: it won bronze at Tokyo 2020, beating Germany 5-4, ending a 41-year wait for an Olympic medal, and bronze again at Paris 2024, beating Spain 2-1. India have won eight Olympic gold medals in men's hockey, the last in 1980.
The win also secured direct qualification for the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. Harmanpreet said a direct Olympic berth would be very useful, because the team would now have ample time to assess its shortcomings and prepare. "Winning and then retaining any title is the result of the collective effort and dedication of the entire team," he said. He also congratulated the women's team on its gold.
The women beat China 1-0 in their final, with Lalremsiami scoring the only goal in the 10th minute. It was their first Asian Games gold since 1982, All India Radio reported, and it too came with a place in Los Angeles.
That 1982 gold was won at the New Delhi Games, where India won all five of their matches, scoring 37 goals and conceding one, and beat Korea in the final, according to the team's record. In the decades since, the women had won silver at the 1998 and 2018 Games and bronze in 1986, 2006, 2014 and 2022, but not gold.
The Olympic place matters for the women in particular. The team has played at three Olympic Games, first in 1980, and finished fourth at both the Moscow Games in 1980 and the Tokyo Games in 2020, its best results. It did not qualify for the Paris Olympics in 2024, after losing to Japan in the bronze-medal match of its qualifying tournament. Its head coach is Sjoerd Marijne.
It was the first time India's men's and women's hockey teams had both won gold at the same Asian Games, All India Radio reported. Together with the cricket and kabaddi titles, it gave India a clean sweep of the men's and women's gold medals in all three team sports in Nagoya.
India finished the Games fourth on the medal table with 85 medals, 21 of them gold. Hockey's two titles came on the Games' final weekend, with the men's final on October 3, the day on which India won five gold medals and climbed from fifth to fourth in the standings.
For both teams, the gold medals remove the need to go through a qualifying tournament for Los Angeles, which is the route the women had to take, unsuccessfully, before Paris. Harmanpreet Singh said the extra time would allow the team to work on its weaknesses before the Olympics.
Both squads now go into the Olympic cycle as Asian champions.
