n this Olympic year, we now highlight the incomparable 'Hockey Wizard' Dhyan Chand. The article is a classic piece of hockey literature written by Rohit Brijnath of India Today. 

They say you can judge a man's legend by the quality of myths that surround him. By that measure itself, Dhyan Chand was an extraordinary man.

They took apart his stick in Holland to see if there was a magnet inside. The Japanese concluded that he used some sort of glue to trap the ball to his stick. German dictator Adolf Hitler offered Dhyan Chand the position of a Colonel in the German army. A Vienna sports club has a statue of Dhyan Chand with four arms holding four hockey sticks!

One thing strikes you - they never said this about any other hockey player, did they? Whenever a tale journeys through time, exaggeration inadvertently rides along. Dhyan Chand had no reams of literature to record his brilliance, no highlight film for us to gasp at. How come then this reverence has come to rest?

We are told that at penalty corners he would stop the ball with his own hand, then rise and strike it with a smooth swiftness. We are told that in his 50s, Dhyan Chand would shame Indian goalkeepers in practice by dropping the ball and then on the half volley drive into the corner of the net. The grey-bearded Gurbux Singh, breathless, talks about how even in 1959, way past his best, no man at the Indian camp could win the ball in a bully-off with him.

You had to wonder, did the poets come to watch him play, and did the playwrights come to watch him play, for he was drama personfied.

We see his magnificence not just in the three Olympic gold medals (1928 Amsterdam, 1932 Los Angeles, 1936 Berlin), but in his goals. Two statistics stand out.

In 1932 India scored 338 goals in 37 matches, 133 being his contribution. In 1947 he accompanied a young team to East Africa (no Dhyan Chand, no team, said the invitation) and Dhyan Chand, 42 and semi-retired, was the second highest scorer with 61 goals in 22 games.

As Keshav Dutt, Olympic gold medallist, reminiscences, "His real talent lay above his shoulders. His was easily the hockey brain of the century. He could see a field the way a chess player sees the board. He knew where his teammates were, and more importantly where his opponents were - without looking. It was almost psychic."

Remember Maradona in the 1986 World Cup final, swivelling blind to send the ball 30 yards or so for Buruchaga to score the winning goal. To not see but to know, to figure the geometry of a field with a blindfold on, that is an idea of a player's completeness.

When Dhyan Chand passed to you, you did not want to miss. On that 1947 tour to East Africa, he put through a wondrous ball to K. D. Singh 'Babu', then turned his back and walked away. When Babu later asked the reason for this odd behaviour, he was told, "If you could not get a goal from that pass, you did not deserve to be on my team."

Dhyan Chand was to hockey what Pele was to soccer, Jack Nicklaus to golf, Muhammad Ali to boxing and Don Bradman to cricket.

When he fell ill with liver cancer, and came to Delhi's All India Institute of Medical Sciences for treatment, they dumped him in the general ward. A journalist's article eventually got him moved to a special room, but the fact that public memory had to be jogged tells its own story.

In Jhansi they had a funeral, not in the ghat, but on the beloved ground that he played on. Players came, but it seemed a little too late. It made it hard to forget the first few words of his autobiography 'The Goal': "You are doubtless aware that I am a common man." Dhyan Chand wasn't, but he died like one.

The Government of India issued a stamp in honour of this Hockey Wizard in 1980.

Photo Courtesy : Wills Book of Excellence - Olympics

t is in the fitness of  things that Khel Ratna Dhanraj Pillai became the first player in the Indian hockey team to have a corporate logo on his hockey stick. The lucky sponsor is Catch Spring Water, and the deal was brokered by indianhockey.com.

Dhanraj would also put on a Catch T-shirt before and after the Olympic matches, and also during the press conferences and interviews that he gives to the world press.

It was a packed press conference that saw Dhanraj Pillai sign a 7 foot poster of himself, before being given a hockey stick by the Catch executives with the Catch logo on it.

Catch Spring Water, apart from being sold in India, also has a presence in Dubai and London, thus making it a multinational brand

Mark Collingwood, who is an administrator with the ABI Group in New South Wales, is this edition's Visitor of the Month. This was his email to the Indian hockey website:

I would like to express my appreciation and thanks to the members of the Indian Hockey team training in Murwillumbah (Australia) as they made my son's day by signing his shirt (on Monday 21/08/00).

high-tech video analysis software called SportsCode is being used by the Australian hockey team to monitor individual performance and analyse team tactics.

The SportsCode technology captures images through video cameras and digitally feeds them back into an Apple computer. The team's coaches then analyse individual plays and team performances during game debriefing. Individual athletes can also see segments of the game instantly to analyse their performance. 

Australian men's hockey coach Terry Walsh believes the technology used for training in the run up to the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games will give the team an edge over the opposition. 

"It's an easy medium to work with, the technology allows us to access pieces of information very quickly," Walsh said.

Built by Australian software developer Ken Knibb, the technology has been upgraded in collaboration with Digital Sports Systems. The time taken to edit footage of upto 8 hours has been cut down to 70 minutes - the duration of a hockey match.

his is our second look at the WNBA - the only professional women's basketball league in the world. We first took a look at it in June 1999 and in this edition we will focus on the growing pains associated with the league. 

With very little overlap between fans of the NBA and WNBA, the league has had a brave struggle in creating and maintaining a new fan base.

Money Matters : The 16-team WNBA has yet to make a profit in its 4 years of operations. The NBA's 29 owners together pay the player salaries and benefits (which totalled $11 million for this year). The comprehensive player benefits include health and dental plans, life insurance, tax saving plan, and paid maternity leave.

In addition, the 16 NBA owners in the cities which have WNBA teams pay for all operating costs of their teams - travel, accommodation, coach salaries and game expenses.

Sponsors : The WNBA had 15 sponsors in year 2000, with typical sponsorship amounts being $10 million over a 3-year period. Of these 15 sponsors, companies like Sears and Buick have been with the WNBA since the first year.

Television : The league has 6-year broadcast agreements with NBC, ESPN and Lifetime. For year 2000, these were the telecast figures:

Network	Nos. of Games Telecast	TV Rating
NBC	11 in the Regular Season 4 in the Playoffs	1.6
ESPN	10 in the Regular Season 10 in thePlayoffs	0.6 - 0.7
Lifetime	10 in the Regular Season 7 in the Playoffs	0.5

Franchises : The WNBA started with 10 teams in 1997. 2 teams were added in 1998, 2 more in 1999, and 4 more in 2000, leading to a present 16-team structure. From a business perspective, 16 teams are better than 8 teams for sponsors looking for a nationwide audience.

Attendance : 2.5 million fans attended the various games of the WNBA this year, with an average attendance of 9,074 per game. Every year, the league carries out a self-evaluation process. Teams with low attendance figure could be moved to another NBA city.

Here's some perspective. The rich and powerful NBA took 29 years to average more than 10,000 fans per game. In contrast, the WNBA average more than 10,000 fans per game in its second and third year of operation.

he annual 4-nation Panasonic Cup took place in Hamburg, Germany from August 4 - August 8. The teams competing were hosts Germany, defending Olympic champions Holland, 1988 Olympic champions Britain and Asia Cup champions South Korea.

When Great Britain lost to Germany 1-6 on the opening day, it was Britain's worst defeat against Germany in 35 matches over the last 44 years. The Germans scored 4 times from 7 penalty corners. Bjorn Michael had a hat-trick in the game, with 2 of the goals coming from penalty corners.

However, Britain came back strong to beat Holland 3-0 in their next match. That was Britain's biggest victory margin over Holland. Britain had last beaten the Dutch back in 1988.

Germany went on to win the Panasonic Cup tournament for the 5th time in six years.

amsung, the official sponsors of the Indian Olympic contingent, have announced hefty incentives to the Indian hockey team if they come back with the Olympic gold. 

The Korean electronics giant will award Rs. 50 lakhs to the players, and Rs. 25 lakhs to the coaches for winning the gold medal.

The announcement was made by Mr. J. H. Park, Vice President (Marketing) of Samsung India, at a send-off party for the Indian hockey squad. The function, held at National Stadium in Delhi, was jointly organised by the Indian Olympic Association and the sponsor.

Samsung has already given Rs. 15 lakhs to the Indian Olympic Association to support its Olympic preparations.