Keramatia do the trick

Unheralded Keramatia High School of Rangpur emerged champions in the First Security Islami Bank National School Hockey Championship following a 2-0 win over Armanitola Govt High School in the final at the Maulana Bhasani Hockey Stadium yesterday.

Nur Hossain Bishal put Keramatia High School ahead in the third minute before Rezaul Islam wrapped up the victory in the 53rd minute to deliver the first trophy at national level to the school from Rangpur. The school's previous best success was winning a summer school and madrasa sports carnival at district level.

Keramatia were better in every aspect of the game on the artificial blue turf compared to last edition's runners-up Armanitola, a school which had previously produced hockey stars such as Abdus Sadek, Sabbir Yousuf, Hossain Iman Chowdury Santa, Jamal Haider, Rafiqul Islam Kamal, Rasel Mahmud Jimmy and Maksudul Alam Habul.

The boys of Keramatia High School took up sticks only a year ago ahead of the Inter-School Hockey tournament in Rangpur.  They won five matches, losing once and drawing twice on their way to winning the national school championship, which had got underway on January 25 at nine different venues with participation of 79 schools.

"Winning the title was beyond our imagination as we were really very satisfied with qualifying for the six-team second-phase of the final round. We were a bit nervous in the final as many of our players were playing on the artificial turf for the first time whereas Armanitola School practice here regularly," Class-10 student Bishal said after the match.

"The wooden sticks which the federation provided us were very poor and we borrowed fibre-made sticks from Bangladesh Police. It was really tough for the players to adjust with the new sticks but they showed their skill to win the match against Armanitola, who seemed over-confident," said Keramatia High School coach Abu Sayeed, who twice played in the Dhaka Premier Division League.

Sayeed informed that this group of boys started playing hockey last year and that they would not give up on playing hockey.

"We won't encourage them to play hockey by foregoing studies as there is no hockey fixtures upcoming. Besides, there is no future for hockey players as the school hockey took place after five years and there is no domestic league in Dhaka and Rangpur," said Sayeed.

However, players like Bishal, Rezaul, Al Amin, Nazim Rahman are determined to continue playing hockey if they get any platform to showcase their talent.