New Delhi, India’s 1975 World Cup heroes Ashok Kumar and Aslam Sher Khan have urged the national hockey team to put the country ahead of individual ambitions, saying an uncompromising desire to win for the nation can help end the 51-year wait for a World Cup medal.
Key Factors
India has won the men’s World Cup only once, in Kuala Lumpur in 1975 when they defeated Pakistan 2-1 in the final. Aslam, who scored the important equaliser in the semi-final against Malaysia, believes the current players need to approach the World Cup with the same sense of patriotism that drove the 1975 team. “When we lost the semi-final in 1971, coach Balbir Singh Sr cried so much that it was difficult to calm him down.
Such was the passion to win for the country,” Ashok recalled.
“That two-week agony led me to score a goal in the last 15 minutes of the semi-final,” Aslam said.
