Bangalore Hi-Fliers

Bangalore Hi-Fliers
Bangalore Hi-fliers emblem
Full name	Bangalore Hi-Fliers
Founded	2005
Dissolved	2008
Manager	Kannan Krishnamurthy
Captain	Tushar Khandekar
Home Ground	Bangalore Hockey Stadium Bangalore India (Capacity 1,000)
League	Premier Hockey League
Position	Premier Hockey League Champions
Home Away

The Bangalore Hi-Fliers are the Premier Hockey League(PHL) team from the IT Hub of India, Bangalore, Karnataka. The team is led by Tushar Khandekar a member of Indian Hockey team. They were previously named as Bangalore Lions because of sponsorship reasons.

Banglore Hi-Fliers is currently the most successful team in Premier Hockey League they won league twice in 2006 ^[1] and 2008,^[2] beating Chandigarh Dynamos on both occasion in play-offs.

History

Founding

The club was formed on the back grounds of inaugural Premier Hockey League in year 2005. It started of with many host of hockey superstars from India, Pakistan and Malaysia. Hi-Fliers is the only teams who in every edition of the PHL displayed tactical and strategic hockey. They have had a good mix of young and experienced players. In the first edition at Hyderabad, their squad had as many as seven members from the national team. They played well in the first leg but failed to maintain the same tempo in the second set of matches and finished a disappointing fourth in the first edition.^[3]

Change Of Name and Rise

In the year 2006 ING Life Insurance became the official team sponsor of Bangalore Hi-fliers and the team was re-christened as Bangalore Lions in the second and third edition. Lions went on to win league in 2006^[4] and in 2007 they finished third,^[5] before going back to the original name in PHL - IV and again winning league.

Lions Era (2006-2007)

Teams name was changed to Lions in 2006,the team played brilliantly throughout and finished as the second team in the league to enter the best-of-three finals and pipped local favourites Chandigarh Dynamos to win the second edition. In the third final, Bangalore's Hariprasad scored a classic goal - that one effort earned him a place in the Indian team for the Asian Games and the World Cup. In the third edition, Bangalore failed to make it to the final by three points and finished third. ^[4][5]

2008

Team's name was again changed in 2008 and they were now called Bangalore Hi-fliers. Hi-fliers went on to win the league in 2008. The greatest strength of the team is their star penalty corner specialist Len Aiyappa. The bald-pated drag flick expert bagged the Top Scorer award in the first 2005. The team's fortunes depend on the ability of their forwardline to get enough short corners for Len to click. Bangalore had eight internationals in their team and is also served by one of the best goalkeepers in the country, Bharath Kumar Chetri. Its Korean import You Hyo-sik has the ability to make speedy runs and he was an asset to the team. They also had two more foreign players Oliver Rutgers and Sebastian Westerholt from the Netherlands. Skipper Tushar Khandekar was the star to watch in the forward line and he has the seasoned and talented Sandeep Michael and Hariprasad to bolster the attack. Sunil and Cheyanna, two upcoming youngsters are the ones to watch out for in the frontline. Former skipper Arjun Halappa had the ability to play as an attacking midfielder and they had Bimal Lakra, a trusted soldier in the midfield, as the fulcrum of the team's fortunes - who was also be ably assisted by VS Vinay. With a mix of good players in all the departments who have the ability to play tactical modern hockey, Bangalore Hi-Fliers looked good for another shot at the title and they did what was expected from them. With their chief coach Ramesh Parameswaran joining the national duties, assistant coach and Olympian Ashish Ballal was in-charge of the coaching staff with another Junior India coach Edward Brient to assist him. Another former international CS Poonacha was the fitness trainer with the secretary of the Karnataka Hockey Association K Krishnamurthy as manager.^[6][7][8]

Bangalore Hi-fliers Season By Season Performance

^{[7][9][10][11]}

Players

First-Team Squad

As of PHL 4 - 2008.^[12]

Name	Country
Tushar Khandekar (Captain)
Bharath Kumar Chhetri
Len Aiyappa
P T RAO
Ajay Kumar Saroha
Arjun Halappa
Vinaya V.S
Bimal Lakra
Vikram Kanth
Cheeyanna
Hari Prasad
S. V. Sunil
K.A.Nilesh
Kamarjit Singh
Olivier Rutgers
Sebastian Westerhout
Hyo Kim

Note: The list of players was obtained from the PHL website.

Other Important Team Personnel

• Ramesh Parameswaran (Chief Coach)
• Ashish Ballal (Asst. Coach)
• Kannan Krishnamurthy (General Manager)
• Poonacha C.S (Trainer)

Former Players

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Former players

Name	Career	Country
Kuttappa	2005
Irshad Ali	2005
Chandrasekhar Xalxo	2005
Pawal Lakra	2005
Amar Aiyamma	2005 and 2007
Sabu Varkey	2005–2007
Sunil Ekka	2005
Ravi Kumar	2006
Ignace Tirkey	2006–2007

Former Players

Name	Career	Country
Mommahad Waqas	2007
Gurpreet Singh	2007
Paul Blake	2007
Laxman Rao NP	2007
Bikramjit Singh	2007
Suresh Kumar	2006–2007
Bimal Lakra	2006–2008
Prabodh Tirkey	2005–2007
Bipin Fernandes	2006

Goal Keepers

^{[9][10][11][13]}

Dates	Name	Country
2005–Present	Bharath Kumar Chhetri
2005	Kuttappa
2006–Present	P T RAO

Club Captains

^{[9][10][11][13]}

Dates	Name	Country
2005–2007	Arjun Halappa
2008–Present	Tushar Khandekar

International Players

^{[9][10][11][13]}

International players

Name	Career	Country
Kuhan Shanmugunathan	2005
Mudassar Ali Khan	2005–2006
Rehan Butt	2006
Jordi Quintana	2006
Paul Blake	2007

International Players

Name	Career	Country
Thijs de Greeff	2007
Sander van der Weide	2007
Olivier Rutgers	2008
Sebastian Westerhout	2008
Hyo Kim	2008

Club Officials

Coaching And Medical Staff

^[13]

• Manager: Kannan Krishnamurthy
• Chief Coach: Ramesh Parameswaran
• Asst Coach: Ashish Ballal
• Physical Trainer: Poonacha C.S

Chief Coach History

^{[9][10][11][13]}

Dates	Name	Country
2005–Present	Ramesh Parameswaran

Honours

• Premier Hockey League Titles: 2
  • 2006,^[1] 2008^[2]

See also

• Premier Hockey League

References