Top national and foreign players to take part in IHF league

Mumbai :

Top Indian players alongwith nearly 60 foreign internationals will feature in the Premier Hockey League-style million dollar hockey tournament to be jointly organised by the IHF and broadcaster Nimbus Sport across the country next year.

It was confirmed by chairman of the Nimbus Sports, Harish Thawani and newly-elected Indian Hockey Federation president R K Shetty.

According to Thawani, the tournament will be played between September 2011 to February 2012 and will feature top Indian players like captain Rajpal Singh, Sardara Singh, Arjun Hallapa, Shivendra Singh, Sandeep Singh, Adrian D'souza etc.

Even though he did not give the exact figures, Thawani said the prize money on offer in the tournament will be over USD 1 million.

Hockey India (HI) had earlier raised serious doubts about the tournament and also questioned IHF's right to rope in national players for such an event because they were not recognised by the game's international body (FIH).

Describing the year 2011 as a crucial year for Indian hockey keeping in mind the Olympic qualifiers, HI had said that they don't see players having any time to participate in such tournaments.

But according to sources, most of the national players have given their nod to play the eight-team league event which will be played across the country on home and away basis.