America
Indian ice hockey team to make maiden tour of Canada
Montreal (Canada), Sep 18
The Indian ice
hockey team will conduct their first tour of North America when they
visit local outfit Brampton Beast here next month.
Brampton
Beast, an affiliate of top National Hockey League (NHL) club Montreal
Canadiens, plays in the second tier East Coast Hockey League (ECHL). The
Indians will play the Beasts at the Powerade Centre here on October 9.
Brampton Beast president and general manager Cary Kaplan is
hoping that the tour will help to increase the popularity of ice hockey
in India.
"We want to shed light on hockey in India. When India
has over 10 ice rinks built and the team is playing at a higher
competitive level, we hope that people remember October 9 as the day
Team India played the Brampton Beast and as the day that ignited a
passion for ice hockey in India as well," Kaplan was quoted as saying by
the Brampton Guardian on Friday.
Ice hockey does not enjoy a strong following in India although the sport is popular in the Himalayan region of Ladakh.
The
majority of the players in the 22-member Indian squad belong to the
army and para-military outfit Indo-Tibetan Border Police. Lack of proper
training and equipment has led to poor performances at the
international level with the Indian team managing to win only one of
their 18 matches -- a 5-1 thrashing of Macau in 2012.
Indian head coach Adam Sherlip hoped that the visit to the Greater Toronto Area would benefit his players.
"We're
really thrilled to connect India's national team to one of Canada's
largest east Indian communities and help develop the program in a great
hub of hockey," he said. "The hope is that this game is a success so
that we can continue to do games like these in the future."
Sherlip
will include about 10-12 players in the Indian team for the tour, and
will hold try outs for the remaining spots in the coming weeks. The
coach is also looking for Canadian players with an Indian background.
Sherlip, who has also coached the Chinese team, is impressed by the players he has seen in India.
"They
love the game no different than we do. They live for hockey. For their
two to three-month winters the only thing they do is play hockey
everyday. If they don't have equipment, they find ways to make it," he
said.