Bangalore Cup from Saturday

The fourth edition of the Dolo-650 Bangalore Cup invitation All-India hockey tournament will kick off at the hockey stadium here from Saturday.

Top national teams Indian Oil Corporation Limited, Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited, Indian Navy and All India Customs have been pitted in Pool A while Army XI, Air India, Indian Air Force and hosts Hockey Karnataka will battle it out in Pool B.

Teams will take on each other in a round-robin format with the top two from each pool advancing for the semifinals and winners locking horns in the final on August 18.

While the tournament will see some formers national stars like VR Raghunath, Adrian D'Souza, Tushar Kandekar and junior World Cup winning captain Harjeet Singh representing their respective clubs, the event won't have any of the current top national players in attendance. The Indian team will be competing in the Olympic Test Event in Tokyo from August 17-21 while the remaining core probables have to undergo training at SAI South Centre.

Raghunath, also the vice-president of Hockey Karnataka, rued their absence but understood the reasoning. "Next year is the Olympics and Hockey India wants the core group to have the best possible training. The boys are undergoing intensive training and it's fair their rhythm shouldn't be broken. But we have guys like Nikkin Thimmaiah, SK Uthappa and Devindar Walmiki who'll be in action. There are few other exciting players also to watch out for," he said on Wednesday.

Stadium refurbishment

Raghunath, meanwhile, said plans are on to refurbish the stadium in Bengaluru as HK intends to stage international matches. "DYES (Department of Youth Empowerment and Sports) has sent a proposal to the state government to renovate the change rooms and washrooms to international standards. We've already requested Hockey India to grant us a couple of international Test matches. Bangalore has been starved of international hockey for more than a decade and current office bearers of HK want to bring it back."