Though the Indian hockey team copped a barrage of criticism after their debacle at Chile, failing miserably to qualify for the Bejing Olympics for the first time in eighty years, one drag flicker had a fairly decent tournament — emerging the highest scorer with ten goals.

Yet, he plunged into turmoil like all others. Though the youngest in the team, V Raghunath had earlier led the challenge in the crucial league game against Great Britain (where he scored a brace), but his lone efforts were in vain as the scoreline finished 3-2 in favour of the opponents.

Talking about the ill-fated final match against Great Britain, Raghunath’s smile faded as he said, “It was just one off-colour match. We did not play to plan and none of us clicked.”

“After the match, all I could hear was silence,” he added.

But the 20-year-old was under pressure as there were plenty of voices against his inclusion in the team. A lot of people wanted to know why PHL hero and experienced drag-flicker Sandeep Singh was missing. But Raghu, as his team mates call him, takes it all in his stride, “There has to be healthy competition. I had a good competitor in Sandeep, but through my performance I proved my place in the team,” said Raghunath, who is employed with IOC.

Picking up the pieces of their shattered dreams and waiting for the dust to settle, Raghu says they have no other go but to look ahead.

There is more hard work in store as the tag of drag-flicker has to be carefully maintained. “In a day, we practice a minimum 150-200 flicks, which help us co-ordinate better. Tushar (Khandekar), Rajpal Singh and Sardara Singh are good with the push and Vikram Kant and Bimal Lakra do their job as well of stopping, so that helps us form a better team,” he maintains, hoping that the combination would click better in the future.