Legendary hockey player and chief coach of India's 1975 World Cup winning team, Balbir Singh Sr, today said Hockey India's felicitation of the squad which brought home the trophy 39 years ago has come too late in the day.
The iconic centre forward, who won gold medals at the 1948 (London), 1952 (Helsinki) and 1956 (Melbourne) Olympics, also said that the deceased players' families should have been invited by HI, which held a felicitation function at Delhi today.
"It is unfortunate. Or rather, it shows that for so many years, there has been no achievement at the Olympic or World Cup level, which is sad," he told PTI here at his residence.
"The honour I got by making the team victorious cannot be expressed in words and definitely, it cannot be measured in any amount of money. Of course, I am happy today that my boys are being honoured and felicitated, but if I was there and among them, it would have made me more happier," added the 90-year-old.
He said that for him helping India regain their supremacy in the sport was the prime goal and he had been successful in his mission.
On families of deceased players not being invited, he felt the HI should have done it.
"The families of these players should have been honoured and given more financial aid than distributed among the surviving legends."
Going down memory lane, Balbir recalled the hard time he faced on personal front in 1975 when his father and freedom fighter, Dalip Singh passed away.
