CHENNAI: The 12-member India women’s squad for the Asia Cup, starting Tuesday at the Sree Kanteerava Indoor Stadium in Bengaluru, know a thing or two about winning. Two years ago, eight of them were part of the winning squad in the ‘B division’, which helped them attain ‘A division’ promotion. However, the competition in the latter is going to be of another level in the next six days.
Besides hosts India, Korea, Japan and Chinese Taipei are in Group A while B comprises Australia, New Zealand, China and the Philippines. India (world ranking 45) are the second lowest-ranked team in the tournament, which gives a picture of the difficult road ahead. In fact, it would not be too fair to expect big things from the home team, who do not even have a domestic league. It might come into existence later in the year, though.
“Playing in Division A will be a huge experience for us, to compete against the best teams in Asia. All other teams have a national league. It is completely different. We cannot compare. We have no league, this is our problem. And we can try as soon as possible to start this league,” said India head coach Zoran Visic. Just to make matters even more difficult, India will open their campaign against defending champions, Japan, who are one of the strongest teams, on Tuesday. The Asian giants are known for their pacy game. Besides other skills, the players’ fitness levels will be tested to the core.
India should count themselves lucky, with physical teams such as Australia and New Zealand in the other group. “We have to be competitive against all teams. The preparation for the competition has been really good. We are not thinking about other teams as such we are looking at the first game of the competition, Japan. One thing is for sure... we are not going to go under our level,” added Visic.
There is a lot to play for the eight teams. The top seven teams of the tournament (along with team promoted from Division B) will feature in the FIBA Pre-Qualifying Olympic tournament in November.
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