Here’s a rendezvous with Sjoerd Marijne, the former coach of Indian women’s hockey team, who added a new chapter to the sports history in India
Back in 2020, when drag-flicker Gurjit Kaur converted India’s lone penalty corner in the 22nd minute of the match against three-time Olympic champions Australia into a goal, a new dawn broke for the India women’s hockey team. The Indian team created history as it stunned Australia to enter their first Olympic semi-finals in Tokyo 2020. It was a ‘Chak de’ moment for not just the team, but for its former coach Sjoerd Marijne as well! The Dutch coach was the man behind this historic feat.
Taking over as the head coach of the team in 2017, Marijne Had instilled a champion’s mentality into the side by working on the mindset of the players. He guided the team to a fourth-place finish at the Tokyo Olympics. But, who’s Marijne? How did he script a new chapter in India’s hockey story? Sports Science India (SSI) caught up with the Marijne who is presently in Netherlands to take our readers through his life and journey. And, as we started a freewheeling conversation with him, he begins by saying: “I keep doing what I am doing, inspire people to get the best out of themselves and let them experience that they can do more than they think!”
Hockey highs
Marijne is a Dutch hockey player and coach. He led the Netherlands’ under-21 women’s hockey team to a World Cup title and then became the coach of the Dutch senior women’s team, which is ranked number one in the world. Between 2011 and 2014, Marijne was also the head coach of the Netherlands under-21 men’s team and later had a short stint in China, coaching the men’s team in provincial Liaoning. He was appointed the chief coach of the Indian women’s national team in 2017 and, after a brief period of success, he was given charge of the men’s team in September that year. In May 2018, he was made the coach of the women’s team once again and he led them to the Tokyo Olympics glory.
Tryst with sports
He was introduced to the world of sports as early as 3 years of age. “Because my parents played tennis, they always took me to the court and that way I started to play when I was only 3 years old. When I became 6 years, they believed it was also important for me to play a team sport, so they advised me to play hockey,” he recollected. Growing up, he was ‘24/7’ hooked to sports. “I wasn’t very good at sitting still and had a lot of energy. I played tennis at the high-level and the good thing about tennis is you can always train. Find a wall and you can start training and that’s what I was doing,” he chuckled. What drew him to hockey was the fact that he enjoyed working towards a common goal
Association with Indian hockey team
He was asked by Dutch field hockey coach, Roelant Oltmans, if he was interested to coach the Indian team. “He was the high performance director at that moment. He knew me from my time as coach of the Dutch national women’s team coach. I was interested because of the potential but even more because of the challenges to work in India,” he said. His journey with the Indian team was filled with ups and downs. “To be honest, more downs than ups! But, we all kept pushing ourselves every day. The willingness of the team was great and one of the reasons why we were successful was because they were open to my ideas. We worked back from our goal to win a medal at the Olympics and I made a plan how we could make this. It’s dealing with setbacks and keeps motivating the team that we can make it. It all starts with the belief. We wanted to improve the position of the women and winning a medal was a way to achieve this!” he shared, adding the present team needs to work on fitness and the mental side. “You need to be mentally strong to perform at the highest-level and deal with the pressure effortlessly,” he advised.
From a player to a coach
“I wasn’t always a player, who started at the first 11, so I had to fight to get into the team. But, I wanted to go to the Olympics. As a player, I was not good enough. So, I could have never made it to the Olympics as a player. But, as a coach I knew there were possibilities to achieve my dream,” he shared as he revealed why he turned focus to coaching players from being a midfielder. But, what was his first assignment as a coach? “It was a club near my place where I lived and a lot of my friends played in the team. It was challenging because they were my friends but also players I need to tell when something was not good. It was a very good learning process towards my first steps as a senior coach,” he shared.
Words of wisdom
To players, he advised to focus on day-to-day goals. “Be open for feedback because that will make you better and stay away from the comfort zone in your training sessions,” he urged the players. As a coach, he believes one of the most important things is to have a vision and to stick to that vision. Besides this, it is important that coaches must create a connection with their players, he added. “That’s why I use a profile test, which clarifies who are they (the players) as a person, what are their talents and in what areas are they facing challenges to perform. Knowing the personality of the players for me as a coach was crucial in the process,” he opined.
Present days
Marijne has turned into an entrepreneur, in and outside sports! He is a motivational speaker and inspires and helps companies to get the best out of their businesses and people. “I share how we went from number 13 of the world to the 4th position at the Olympics. Nobody believed we could do it and eventually we did it and I believe I can help others to achieve the same as us. We created a legacy even we didn’t win a medal and that’s my goal to let people and corporates experience the same,” said Marijne, who is also coaching performance coaches these days.
