Jugraj couldn't speak to family after WC loss
- Rourkela: Jugraj Singh was part of the World Cup squad as one of the alternate players and didn't get a chance to play. Even then, he was completely involved in the process, and like everybody it was tough for him to accept the loss against New Zealand in the crossovers. So tough that he didn't even speak with his family for the first few days.
- "I couldn't talk to my fami- ly for 2-3 days in the beginning. They all knew what had happe- ned and they were hurt too. I just kept thinking about the fi- nal moments of the game. So that's why we are now just fo- cussed on the days ahead and want to make sure days such as those don't come in the future again," said the 26-year-old.
- But with the classification matches still to go, they had to pull themselves up and they did that by speaking a lot among themselves and with Pro League matches." the coaches.
- "Despite all that, the day will remain to be a sad day for us but we want to be focussed on the future now," he added.
- Going forward, the team has got off to a great start follo- wing their World Cup debacle so far as they earned three back-to-back wins in FIH Pro League mini-tournament he- re. They will be playing Austra- lia on Wednesday again in the- ir last game of the mini-tour- nament and another win will do a lot of good to their morale.
- Asked what the team's aim was ahead of this tournament, Jugraj said, "With the Asian Games coming up, we were highly focused on doing well. We made mistakes during the World Cup, and we have been working on them during the Pro League matches."
- India have been truly im- pressive in these three Matsches scoring a total of 14 goals of which Jugraj scored two goals. The first was from a penal- ty stroke against Australia and the next was from a penalty corner against Germany as India won 6-3.