India was dealt a heartbreaking 1-0 loss against Pakistan in the final, but it was the fourth successive campaign that they had won a medal.
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There exists an old cliche that says all things must come to an end, good or bad. When that is put into the context of India at the Olympics, it could only refer to the country’s hockey team. By the time the 1960 Olympics, which was held in Rome came about, India was the outright ruler of the world at hockey. They had achieved an unimaginable feat of winning three consecutive gold medals in the sport, and they had done it twice. However, it was time for that run to finally come to an end. Well, winning a silver medal is still an incredible feat, but there really is nothing like first place. Perhaps the Indian fans do not feel that hurt by the fact that their team was beaten in the final. But if we look at the team that defeated them, well that changes things. It was none other than their arch-rivals Pakistan.
It is important to understand that while the Indian hockey team had been a force to reckon with at the previous three Olympics, their dominance over the sport was at a decline. The victories at the 1948 and 1952 Olympics had come with relative ease, but the 1956 Olympics was anything but. Sure, the nation scored a whopping 38 goals and managed to win the whole tournament without conceding a single one, but that does not necessarily mean that they won every single game convincingly. Take the final against Pakistan that year, India barely managed to scrape a 1-0 victory over their neighbors. In the very next edition, it was Pakistan’s turn to return the favor.
Ahead of the 1960 Olympics, the hockey team was dealt with a massive, but inevitable blow. Their star man for over a decade, Balbir Singh Sr, announced his retirement from the sport. It was no doubt a well-deserved retirement, but it left India with no one even close to the former skipper’s caliber upfront. What India did have was other veteran players who have won the gold medal for the nation. The responsibility of leading the team fell on the shoulders of veteran half-back Leslie Claudius.
The team did, however, have a healthy mix of youth and experience. The likes of John Peter, Prithipal Singh, and Joginder Singh were all set to make their Olympics debut and were keen on leaving a positive impression on the grand stage. They also had the experience in the form of skipper Claudius, Shankar Laxman, and Raghbir Singh Bhola who had seen it all before.
Much like in the previous editions of The Games, India breezed through the group stages, but the cracks were showing in their armor. They did concede only one goal in the group stages but there was a sense of doubt about their style of play. The team even trailed for the first time in the history of the Olympics to the Dutch before turning it around. Bhola’s incisive scoring and Prithipal Singh’s short corner conversions, however, masked the shortcomings at the time as India netted 17 goals and won all their matches in the group stages.
Ever since Balbir Singh Sr’s retirement, the Indian team was forced to change their style of play. Not taking anything away from Raghbir Singh Bhola, but nobody could live up to the sheer talent and skill that Balbir Singh Sr displayed consistently for so many years. As a result, it was getting rather tiresome for India to take a direct approach to the games. Rather, they employed a hit-and-run style of hockey, which they were largely unfamiliar with.
“It was a delight in the past to watch our forwards indulge in quick short passing and skillful dribbling,” said SM Sait, the then vice president of the Indian Hockey Federation. “Now what we saw in Rome was a different picture altogether. Our players were trying to outdo our opponents in hard-hitting and individual thrusts,” he had added.
The new style was barely working for the Indians. In the quarter-finals, India came up against Australia. The Australians deployed an extremely defensive tactic as they sat deep in their half, soaking up waves of Indian pressure. Now without the slick passing and dribbling moves, it was always going to be difficult for India to break the backline down. The game eventually went to extra time and it was Bhola’s strike from a penalty corner that won the match for the Indians.
The roles were reversed in the semi-finals as India faced Great Britain. The British team was the one that threw waves of pressure at the Indians. India could not even get the ball out of their own half for most of the game. In that match, goalkeeper Shankar Laxman and defender Prithipal Singh were immense. The experienced duo was rock solid and thwarted all attempts on goal. Udham Singh’s goal eventually won the match as India buckled up to face Pakistan.
The thing about that Pakistan team was that they had more than the hunger to win a medal. That team remembered the heartbreak caused by the Indians four years ago, and they were determined to return the favor. That Pakistan side wanted to win the match more than the Indian side, and it showed in the performance.
“We had undergone rigorous three to four months training in the camp at Lahore where the morale of players was very high and the slogan ‘Victory at Rome’ was written all over the walls of our bedrooms and elsewhere which infused a fighting spirit among the players,” recalled Abdul Waheed Khan, a member of the Pakistan hockey team.
They took an early lead as Naseer Bunda scored in the 11th minute to give Pakistan the lead. The Indian team was caught by surprise and was in total disarray. As a matter of fact, they were so disgruntled by the quick early goal, that they failed to mount a threatening attack in the entire match. Pakistan held on to the slender lead and won the first gold medal in its history.
