Old habits die hard, Indians fail to emblazon name again

RIO DE JANEIRO: We don’t really seem to learn from our mistakes in Indian sport. During the Glasgow Commonwealth Games two years ago, the Indian boxing team’s kit

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RIO DE JANEIRO: We don’t really seem to learn from our mistakes in Indian sport. During the Glasgow Commonwealth Games two years ago, the Indian boxing team’s kit had arrived late.

Then, it had India emblazoned on the jerseys in a font size larger than that allowed by the international federation. That time they had used red and blue permanent markers to pare the lettering enough to get it down to what the rules allowed.

Here in Rio, the ad-hoc fellows running boxing in this country seem to have decided that Glasgow would certainly not be repeated. So, they put nothing on the jerseys. Rules stipulate that the name of the country must be on the jersey of each competitor. Manoj Kumar apparently unwrapped his jersey just before the bout and to his horror discovered that the country was just not mentioned on the garment.

Chief coach GS Sandhu is doubling up as manager for these Games and seems to have failed to check what was after all his responsibility. But then he is distracted given that he has to look out for the practice schedules and match preparedness of his three charges. India were let off by a warning from the international boxing federation but not before there were many red faces all around.