Amsterdam on Wednesday announced the long-awaited arrival of Li Hong. So the Chinese international is settling down in the Tulip big league. The Dutch league has seen a lot of high-profile Asian field hockey players come and go in recent years. We list six special players from this continent.
Shahbaz Ahmed
Let’s start this special company with one of the best field hockey players of all time. Shahbaz Ahmed was one of the last superstars of Pakistani field hockey, just before the period when water fields made their appearance in field hockey. The man with the electric heels was a regular attraction on the fields in the late 1980s to the late 1990s. His long dribbles, at full speed – hence that nickname – were unprecedented. After the 1998 World Cup, he ended up in the Netherlands, with Oranje Zwart. For two years he was a crowd pleaser in Eindhoven, where his teammates gave him another telling nickname: field hockey king.
Sardar Singh
Unfortunately, the arrival of Sardar Singh proved that things do not always end well with foreign stars. Another Asian dribbling specialist with hero status in his own country. There, around 2010, he was the hope after some dismal Indian field hockey years and the highest-paid player in the 2013 Hockey India League. Meters-high posters of Sardar hung in New Delhi. That image (and his achievements in the national team) created high expectations when the Indian left for Bloemendaal later that year. A fairytale marriage beforehand. In practice, it fell foul. There was no time and space for Singh’s old school dribbling in the big league, so he lost his luster. After only six months, the two sides parted ways. The match made in heaven eventually turned out to be an illusion.
Shahbaz Ahmed. Photo: KNHB
Ma Yibo
Unfortunately, in field hockey not all facts are equally well documented. So we cannot report with certainty how many Chinese players preceded Li Hong. Not many, we dare say. One of the last Chinese field hockey players to make her appearance in the big league was Ma Yibo. A figurehead of field hockey in China at the beginning of this century. The 2008 Games silver medalist was renowned for her scoop and corner. She showcased those frequently in 2009-2010 at Pinoké, which was fighting relegation at the time. In the pouring rain, away from Push, Yibo became the hero of the playoffs. Thanks in part to her hat trick, the Dutchmen stayed in the big league. Oh yes. At the same time as Yibo, Song Qinling came over from China to Pinoké. The striker made less of an impression than Yibo, but did give an assist in the farewell game against Push.
Sohail Abbas
Another Pakistani legend, who broke through a few years after Shahbaz. Sohail Abbas had made scoring goals his life’s goal. And he too had such a brilliant nickname: The king of the dragflick. Indeed, Abbas was a drag flick specialist. In 311 international games, he scored 348 goals, and according to tradition, no one scored more international goals than Abbas. The defender was also extremely productive in the big league with Amsterdam (1999-2000) and Rotterdam (2005-2009). In addition to over eighty goals, he also asserted himself off the field. Abbas was one of the initiators of the benefit game between international players and the Dutch team, when Pakistan was hit by an earthquake.
Kaori Chiba at Rotterdam.
Kaori Chiba
Regularly, Japanese internationals descend on the big league. About eight years ago, Shihori Oikawa and Hazuki Nagai played at Oranje-Rood. A little more recently, Moeka Tsubouchi and Kaho Tanaka came to Klein Switzerland. They all followed in the footsteps of one of their country’s best field hockey players of all time: Kaori Chiba, the triple Olympian who played with Rotterdam between 2007 and 2010. The small midfielder lived through the aftermath of the top years at Hazelaarweg and regularly scored goals. In between, she was nominated twice for the title of World Player of the Year. And still no Japanese player can match her.
Jong-Ho Seo
The best South Korean field hockey player of all time cannot be left out of this list. Jong-Ho Seo barely spoke the Dutch language, but conquered field hockey hearts wherever he went. At Klein Zwitserland and especially at Laren and Pinoké, the lightning-fast attacker made a big impression. This was also due to his fearlessness. Seo dived and flew at every ball, like the Asian version of Roel Bovendeert. In the same period (about fifteen years back), Hyo-Sik You also came to the Netherlands. He stood in Seo’s shadow, but is still active in top field hockey: as an international referee. In Seo’s slipstream, his girlfriend Hye-Loung Han also came along to Laren and Pinoké. Unfortunately for those clubs, she came nowhere near the level of her partner.
by Hockey.nl
