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Hockey’s governing body in India, Hockey India (HI), hosted a ‘good luck dinner’ for the departing men’s and women’s teams for the upcoming World Hockey League (WHL) semi-finals. The WHL semis will be held in Antwerp, Belgium from 20th June to July 5th July.
Following the jersey number pattern followed in other sports, HI gave caps to each team member which had their number inscribed on it. The captains – Sardar Singh (men’s team) and Ritu Rani (women’s team) – were given the number 1.
HI President Narinder Batra believes the numbers will stay with the players for a lifetime. He explained the idea behind giving the players unique numbers at the dinner.
“The idea behind this initiative of giving a unique number to each player was done keeping in mind that players across the world are very attached to their jersey numbers. Hence, we thought to give a permanent number to each player and it will stay with them for lifelong,” Batra said.
At the event, the 18-member squads from both the teams were present apart from 8 reserve men’s team players and 7 reserve women’s team players.
The men’s team have been grouped in Pool A alongside Australia, Pakistan, France and Poland while the women’s team face Belgium, New Zealand, Poland and Australia in Pool B.
