Bhubaneswar: After a successful start with the inaugural programme involving 30 girl-trainee cadets, Naval Tata Hockey Academy Odisha (NTHAO) is all set to induct 30 boys in the coming months. Established a year ago, the NTHAO that was established at Kalinga Stadium here, is considered as the state’s Hockey High-Performance Centre (HPC).
“The HPC has an ambitious program to take hockey skills from its existing 10 grassroots centres and 3 Regional Development Centres at Bhubaneswar, Panposh and Sundargarh to elite level in next 3-5 years. The boys’ programme will have 30 resident cadets in the under-17 age group,” said Sports Minister of Odisha Tusharkanti Behera.
“We see positive results in the girls and are confident that the HPC will be able to provide similar highly focused and professional training to the boys too,” he added.
This will push the program across its talents to bridge the gaps between grassroots and elite HPC and provide more opportunities to the young and promising players.
The new initiative of setting up a number of synthetic turfs in identified locations of Sundargarh will help the young talents’ growth and a professional HPC like NTHAO will impart advanced training environment and skills while ensuring optimum exposure to the world of hockey, Behera said.
