Sandeep, Shivendra returns; Danish, Gurvinder out with injury

Senior drag-flicker Sandeep Singh and forward Shivendra Singh today returned to the Indian men's hockey team for the FIH World League Round 3 (semi-finals) to be held at Rotterdam, The Netherlands from June 13-23.
Sandeep, who was left out of the Indian squad for the FIH Hockey World League Round 2 held here earlier this year, made a comeback to the national side along with Shivendra, who last played for India in last year's London Olympics.
Sandeep, incidentally, was part of the Indian squad that went to The Netherlands in April for an invitational tour.
Sardar will continue to lead the 18-member squad while drag-flicker V R Raghunath has been named his deputy.

Notable absentees from the squad are midfielder Danish Mujtaba and Gurvinder Singh Chadi as both are injured. While Gurvinder continues to be in the sidelines because of a prolonged ankle injury, Danish is suffering from a ligament tear.
According to a statement from Hockey India, the squad was selected by HI selectors Balbir Singh, B P Govinda, chief coach Michael Nobbs, Roelant Oltmans (Director-High Performance) along with government observer Harbinder Singh during a meeting held on May 17.

The squad has two goal-keepers in P R Sreejesh and P T Rao, four defenders, five mid-fielders and seven forwards.
"Both Sandeep and Shivendra have managed to make a comeback sheerly on the basis of their performance and fitness. During the camp they have proved that they still have fire in their belly to represent India," a national selector told PTI.

The senior men's team is currently based at the Netaji Subhas Southern Centre (NSSC), Bangalore where they are attending a national camp, which started on May 16, as final preparations for the upcoming tournament.