VADODARA: After beating Germany by 5-4 to win the bronze medal at Tokyo Olympics on Thursday, the Indian hockey team and coach got a call from Prime Minister Narendra Modi and they thanked him for his inspirational talk after their semi-final loss.
The coaches told Modi that his talk motivated the team to perform well. Exactly 85 years ago in the month of August, the Indian hockey team led by Major Dhyanchand too was in need of motivation while taking on Germany in the finals of hockey at the 1936 Berlin Olympics.
And, it was Maharaja Sayajirao Gaekwad of Baroda state, whose pep talk lifted the morale of the team during the halftime. Historian and art curator Chandrashekhar Patil said, “Maharaja Sayajirao had gone to Germany in 1936 to watch the Berlin Olympics. He watched the hockey finals between India and Germany from the stadium pavilion where Adolf Hitler too was present.”
“In the first half, the Indian team could score just one goal and Sayajirao noticed that the players were struggling. So, he decided to meet the players at halftime. The players told him that they were struggling to play properly in shoes as they are used to playing bare feet. Sayajirao had given them shoes for playing in the finals,” Patil told TOI.
“The king immediately asked them to remove their shoes and play their natural game. The team was a bit nervous as it was playing against the Germans in Germany. Sayajirao gave a pep talk to Major Dhyanchand and the team, and asked them to win the finals,” Patil added. Dhyanchand scored three goals in the second half and India beat Germany 8-1 to win the gold medal.
