Harpal Singh Bedi
Mumbai’s Javed Nuruddin Shaikh. has been named best umpire 2019-2020 by Hockey India.
“I am elated to have been awarded for my work in the country and in world hockey. I would like to thank Hockey India for their continued support and for recognising my work on the field of play. “was the reaction of the seasoned umpire.
Shaikh, who was awarded at the 10th Hockey India Congress, for his outstanding efforts has been officiating for the past two decades.
“Officiating and Umpiring are one of the hardest roles you can play in sport. You are always surrounded by individuals on the pitch who want to do their best for their respective teams, but what people often don’t recognise is the fact that we also want to do our best, and always aim for flawless and error-less decision-making under severe pressure.” he said
However, the things have changed for better “I think Hockey India has done an exemplary job when it comes to providing people like me the platform to deliver. They have been encouraging individuals across the country to come forward and participate in umpiring.”
“Back when I started umpiring, there would only be a couple of Indian Umpires at International tournaments, but now due to a proper structure that is in place, there are more than 15 people from India in the International panel, which includes Technical Officials, Umpires and Umpire Managers. he told Hockey India in Mumbai
In India, we have been able to create more competition, and with people getting more chances to officiate in international tournaments, there has been immense exposure for all of us,” he added.Shiekh began his career as an umpire in 2000 at a local tournament in Mumbai, and in 2002, he was called-up as a National Umpire, which was followed by an opportunity at the 2003 Under-21 Invitational Cup in Poland where he served as an International Umpire for the first time.
During the course of his career, Shaikh has umpired at major events such as Commonwealth Games, Asian Games as well as the 2014 Men’s World Cup in Hague, The Netherlands and at the 2018 Odisha Men’s World Cup in Bhubaneswar, Odisha, and was also called up as an Umpire during the 2016 Rio Olympics. His commitment to umpiring and the desire to keep improving has meant he now serves as an International/FIH – Olympics Games Panel Umpire.
Talking about fitness he said there has to be a special focus on umpires fitness levels . “With hockey being such a fast paced sport, we as officials, also cover a lot of ground, and to do that, we have to be at our best fitness-wise.
“We now have various training programmes to stay sharp, and to maintain our fitness levels. Not many people are aware, but we also have our target Yo Yo scores, which prove to be a good test to monitor our fitness,” he opined.
Shaikh was of the view that the use of technology and social media apps like WhatsApp has paved way for smoother coordination and communication.
“Our use of WhatsApp during tournaments started 5-6 years ago, when we first created a group before the first-ever Hockey 5s National Championship. What we were able to do there was, get our officials to watch, read and engage in rules related to this new format.
We put videos, text and information related to officiating and umpiring, along with the challenges and scenarios we might face during competition. This really helped in us to become better prepared for the tournament, and when certain situations did arise, we were already clear as to what decision we had to make,” .
“Since then, we’ve followed the same for all our domestic, as well as international assignments. We’ve also managed to make use of this lockdown period to good effect, and have been able to sharpen our knowledge, skills and decision-making process through online sessions organised by Hockey India, in order to be better prepared for future events,” he added .