CHENNAI: It's fair to say Indian hockey players have seldom relished the big stage at home, especially during blue riband events like the World Cup. Post the disappointment of the last edition in 2023, then coach Graham Reid spoke about what a mental conditioning coach could do to the team.
"It (requirement of a mental conditioning coach) has come up (for discussion) before but I did not really think it was needed at that point," he had said. "I thought, I had enough experience to be able to impart the sort of stuff we have been talking about." The Australian further elaborated that a mental conditioning coach was needed to help the team deal with pressure. On Friday night, under the bright lights, Shardanand Tiwari embraced pressure like an old friend. Three times he stepped up and all three times he converted the penalty stroke in the shoot-out after the Belgian keeper had felled a player during the rolling penalty.
In hockey, you are allowed to name a penalty stroke specialist for fouls like this and the Indian team had no hesitation in naming the 21-year-old.
There was something about the way he embraced pressure that caught the eye. But it could have all gone pear shaped if he had not taken the video referral after the Belgian had kept out his first penalty stroke in the shoot-out.
"I was still in shock," he says. "I was like, 'how did he save this?' I thought I had it hit it pretty well. I was still processing and had turned back towards my time with my head down when one of my teammates asked me to take the referral. He was like 'ask the umpire, I'm sure it was a foul'.
It indeed was — the goalkeeper had moved to the right hand side, the side favoured by Tiwari — but the Indian defender was so lost in the moment he had forgotten he could review.
"Post that review, I was fine." He walked again to the spot, placed the white ball and moved a few steps back. The crowd, after realising the foul, had found their voice as they willed the Indian on to equalise in the shootout.
When the ball found the net, there was an enormous release of tension. Like a cork had been released from a bottle of something very strong. But Tiwari, who has featured in a home junior Would Cup before (2021 in Bhubaneswar), was composure personified. "When I was walking back (after taking the stroke), I knew I may be needed."
He was needed two times and both times he found the net.
How did he become so good from seven yards out? "I don't really have an answer for this," Tiwari, the son of a guard and a housewife, says. "I don't even train all that much for penalties. Maybe every week I train twice but I don't hit that many balls. Maybe five or 10 times per training session, not that much."
But what he does have a lot of is belief in himself, a trust in God — 'bhagwan ke bharose' is something he keeps saying during the conversation — and knowing that his teammates will have his back whatever the result. "My teammates support me a lot, they give me a lot of confidence. Even otherwise, I know I have a lot of strength to convert these penalties. That's why I started taking penalties as well as penalty corners. I'm guessing all of these factors have helped me."
It has helped the defender carve a place for himself in the junior set-up. But it was by accident that he picked up a hockey stick. When he was growing up in Lucknow, he was fascinated by kites that would fly over his head. So, he wanted to fly as well but the nearby stadium — KD Singh Babu Stadium — was locked for people who didn't have a stick. So 'I bought one for Rs 80 to enter the Stadium'. That was when he was a kid.
A decade later, he's become an important cog in India's wheel.