In hockey circles, Dr. Saju Joseph needs no introduction. “Saju Sir,” as we fondly call him, is a qualified hockey and football referee. In a nearly three-decades-long career, he donned many professor-like hats in the field hockey game.
Dr. Saju Joseph is a man of high virtue and value. He was the physical trainer and assistant hockey coach of junior and senior India Men (1996 -2005), worked as an assistant coach/biomechanics expert with the Malaysian National Field Hockey Team at the National Institute of Sports (NIS) in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (2006 – 2019) and very recently, worked as High-Performance Director, Sports Authority of India, Bengaluru, India (2019 – 2022).
Courtesy LinkedIn
In his new book Seizing the Opportunity: The Artist’s Gallery For Penalty corner & Drag Flick. Dr. Saju Joseph talks about field hockey’s important goal-scoring opportunities, ‘penalty corner’ and ‘drag flick’ to technical depth and finesses perfectionisms.
There are many ways in which a goal is scored in hockey, i.e., hit, push, flick, slap, backhand, etc. However, two essential things in this category are a penalty corner and a drag flick.
A drag flick is an attacking technique within a penalty corner and involves scoop and flick. In this scoring opportunity, a player crouches down very close to the ball, picks it up on the shaft, and pushes along the ground with the stick in a rather slinging action. One big difference between a ‘drag flick’ and a ‘hit’ is, in the rules of hockey, a ‘drag flick’ is classified as a ‘push.’ Jay Stacy, a triple Olympic hockey medalist, is known for using this for the first time in the Australian Hockey Championships at Hobart in 1987.
On the other hand, a ‘penalty corner,’ also called a ‘short corner,’ is awarded against a defending team for an infringement in the penalty circle – a 23-meter area. On the field, attackers envisage this as a great scoring opportunity. Ever since hockey moved from grass to turf in the 1970s, ‘penalty corners’ gained high importance despite equally high criticism. Amstelveen Hockey World Cup winner in 1973, Paul Litjens specialized in a ‘penalty corner’ and, to his credit, 268 goals from 177 international appearances for The Netherlands. Paul was the top scorer in the 1976 Montreal Olympics and the 1981 Hockey Champions Trophy at Karachi.
The personality and professional he is, Dr. Saju Joseph mentions the names of excellent drag flickers in the game of field hockey – Floris Jan Bovelander (The Netherlands), Florian Kunz (Germany), Abraham (“Bram”), Taeke Wiebe Doekes Taekema (The Netherlands), Calum Giles (Great Britain), Sohail Abbas (Pakistan), Jorge Maximiliano Lombi Etulain (Argentina), Troy Elder (Australia), Chris Ciriello (Australia), Mink Van Der Weerden (The Netherlands), Gonzalo Peillat (Argentina), Hayden Shaw (New Zealand), Lehn Aiyappa (India), and Sandeep Singh (India).
Saju Joseph (photo courtesy LinkedIn)
More important and predominant to execute the above, the field stick is a sacred armoury in hockey. This is probably the first book wherein a detailed classification and evolution of hockey sticks remains mentioned and elucidated. Hockey sticks are classified based on their bow, curve, location, and blade profile, and Dr. Saju Joseph very elegantly explains the five types of sticks – standard stick, mid-bow stick, dyna-bow stick, jum-bow stick, and pro bow stick. Drag flicking technique, he says, “depends upon the physical characteristics of an individual, his strength factors, the movement speed of lower extremities, etc.,” and he expounds on the six techniques of some very high-quality drag flickers.
- Slide step technique – Bram Lomans (The Netherlands)
- Front foot technique – Gonzalo Peillat (Argentina)
- Back foot cross-over technique – George Lombi (Argentina), Sohail Abbas (Pakistan), Lehn Aiyappa, and Sandeep Singh (India).
Across twenty-seven chapters in this book, Dr. Saju Joseph talks about many an unread and unaddressed technique and information of the game – changes in stick dimensions, grip and holding, training stages and implications in a ‘drag flick,’ defensive structure in ‘penalty corner,’ the role of stoppers in field hockey, tactics and strategy in the attack of ‘penalty corner,’ periodisation and planning, and strength and conditioning.
He has elucidated in detail the technique of ‘drag flick’ execution by giving real-time on-field examples of six great players who are known for executing this technique into successful scoring shots – Jorgi Lombi (Argentina), Gonzalo Peillat (Argentina), Bram Lomans (The Netherlands), Len Aiyappa (India), Sandeep Singh (India) and Sohail Abbas (Pakistan). It will become a new book if one has to tell in detail about every player to their fullest potential.
The foreword, written by Dr. Barry Dancer, touches on how coaches and sports scientists like Dr. Saju Joesph are essential to field hockey in many beautiful ways. Barry, a silver medalist at the Montreal Olympics, has a tremendous record as an Australian Coach from 2001 – 2008 – Podium finishes in Champions Trophy, World Cup, Commonwealth Games, and Olympics (Gold, Athens 2004 and Bronze, Beijing 2008).
The most tangible and tactile stress of holding the lead happens before closing in the game’s final quarter. A 2-goal is seen as more of a liability than an asset. You’re taking care of many moving positions with defenders moving into the wing, forwards occupying the back line, etc., and you, the eleven, are responsible for the change of positive outcome, even with few seconds to go. Once the hooter goes up, that’s it. Match and medal won, history made.
For months and years, I’ve comforted myself by reading my favourite book on field hockey – “Forgive Me Amma” by Sundeep Misra. I’ve questioned my thought process and vented my emotions at the lack of a proper old-school book on my favorite game. I lazed and slept in libraries waiting for one book I could proudly call mine. A book will represent my game in how it should be played and valued. I’ve questioned my language and vocabulary for my choice in sports writing. I feel shamelessly helpless and clownly unskilled at the thought of not being able to do anything for hockey in India. Not anymore.
Chapters 26 and 27 are the longest and my favourite among the twenty-seven chapters of this historic book. While chapter 26 outlines a detailed training program plan to suit the modern-day four-quarter game, chapter 27 elucidates training drills that will bolster the physical, physiological fitness and energy expenditure of today, i.e., kneeling and dragging with a single hand/both hands, learning of whipping action, lunge and drag flick coordination, dummy flick drill with and without approach, activating pectoral muscle with line control, knee flexed heel during lunge and less dorsi flexion angle during a lunge, etc.
Perhaps this is why I was exhausted and tired of life. Even as I write this, I’m exhausted and wish to enjoin a rest that will not come. And yet there is a sense of longing for intriguing faculties, a rare certainty of astuteness and capabilities, and a muted bliss.
Amsterdam to Melbourne was a honeymoon we will cherish the most. But, then, mild to heavy turbulence embraced the flight from Rome to Montreal and Moscow. Los Angeles to Tokyo via Seoul, London, and Rio de Janeiro remains a sorry tale. Tokyo is an oasis in an otherwise synthetic and arid plateau.
It will all fade as everything does. But for now, there is nothing to do but observe my brain at its finest and accept that I have no choice but to allow it to go to “waste.” Of course, I am vigilant that some of this must be erroneous and that I possibly don’t become clowny on conventional days. But I know that my current self-assurance and expeditiousness won’t last.
For research scholars in biological and medical sciences, “Harrison’s Principles of Internal Medicine” is the equivalent of The Bible. In an intriguingly complex world of sports science and physiology, Dr. Saju Joseph’s book is more pertinent and apposite than ever with its cutting-edge concept and content on the sport.
Dr. Saju Joseph does everything in his considerable scientific, callisthenic, plyometric, and isometric powers to accentuate the faculty and artistry across the spectrum and facets we call field hockey.
