BHUBANESWAR: With India seemingly in command, coach Craig Fulton gathered his players inside the locker room at half-time during the Pro League encounter against Australia on Thursday. Being in command was one thing but for the majority of the first stanza, they were not in control. In fact, they had to overturn a 0-2 deficit. Sure, they were leading 4-2 after 30 minutes but they couldn't afford to let it slip. So, the South African told his players about the need to be in control. He said as much when the broadcaster asked him his thoughts before the beginning of the third quarter.
At that exact moment, it wasn't hard to wonder whether Indian hockey has ever been in control in recent memory. For a side whose history is so decorated, its recent decades has swung wildly like an out-of-control pendulum. It has seen scandals, debacles, internal squabbles... you get the drift. In fact, the only time they were in control was the side of 2000, they won a bronze at the Olympics (a settled squad, a coach who felt secure and an administration that pulled in the right direction).
Thirty minutes after Fulton's call to arms, the electronic scoreboard read: "IND 4-6 AUS". The coach had asked for control. He got confusion. In essence, he was treated to the very familiar picture of hopelessness, hopefulness, before, abandoning all sense of hope. From 0-2 to 4-2 to 4-6. Against other teams, scoring four may have guaranteed a win. If the opponent is Australia, it merely keeps them competitive. The numbers bear this out. The last two times India beat Australia (they had to score at least four to seal victory). The last time India had beaten Australia without having to score four came in 2016 when the scoreline finished 3-2.
It's probably why Fulton sees the defence as this side's mega project. He's not somebody who wants to park the bus but he wants to have at least a vehicle on standby at the back before working on the constituent parts further up the field. Limit Australia (also applies to Netherlands and Belgium) to not more than two goals and you become contenders to win a global medal.
That isn't entirely out of place, even in a high-scoring sport like hockey. Out of the six Olympics held since 2000, only once has a team won gold after conceding more than two goals a game (Argentina in 2016 when they shipped 17 across eight games). To just put things in some perspective, India let in 23 across eight games in 2021 when they won bronze.
In other words, if they have designs on bettering that bronze, they will have to have that discipline at the back. While India are on that journey, Fulton has previous for that sort of thing. He made history when he coached Ireland to a first Olympics (2016) in more than 100 years. That honour saw him being named the 2015 FIH coach of the year.
One only needed to ask Michael Robson for what Fulton did with the Irish side before he became an important member of Belgium's backroom staff. "We all bought into what he was trying to do," he said after their match against Spain on Thursday. "He made us very tough to beat. We were defensively very good. We learned a lot from him."
During his first full press conference as coach of India, Fulton spoke about this exact thing when he was asked about his coaching philosophy. "Personality wise," he had said, "I like to defend to win. So, I like to have our defensive structure in place because that is the first step of attacking. If you want to play counter-attacking style, that doesn't help if you can't defend... I'm a very forward, attacking coach, I like to score goals but I also like a solid defence."
To outsiders, it may sometimes look boring — it certainly was for vast swathes of the game between his current employers and the ones who gave him his break before 2016 — but it was devoid of jeopardy. The European outfit, who are in the same group as India in Paris, had a few set-piece opportunities but they generally didn't look threatening. However, for such a style to work, the forwards have to be clinical with their finishing while the defenders should be free of errors in the box.
Which the forwards weren't for the first 58 minutes and 59 seconds. That's before Gurjant Singh's first-time drive from the edge of the D gave India victory by the thinnest of margins.