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| Biggest achievement of life but plenty more to come: Harmanpreet on Khel Ratna award | | | Agencies
NEW DELHI, Jan 4: Elated to become a Khel Ratna awardee after his career-defining Olympic performance, Indian men's hockey team captain Harmanpreet Singh said the honour is a recognition of his "fascinating" journey in which he still has plenty more to achieve.
Double Olympic-medallist shooter Manu Bhaker, chess world champion D Gukesh, Harmanpreet and Paralympic high jump gold-winner Praveen Kumar were finalised for the 2024 Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna award by the sports ministry on Thursday.
"(It's the) biggest recognition of my life. It's a big achievement for me. I am really very happy. It think it's the best part of my life that I am getting such a huge award and recognition," the 28-year-old Harmanpreet, who was India's top goal-scorer in the Paris Games with 10 strikes, told PTI in an interview.
The ace drag-flicker has won most of the prominent awards and accolades in his career, including back-to-back Olympic bronze medals, a junior World Cup gold in 2016, a Commonwealth Games silver, an Asian Games gold and bronze besides two silver medals in the Champions Trophy.
Harmanpreet has also claimed the FIH Player of the Year award three times, including the year gone by. But he is far from satiated.
"Throughout my journey I have learnt a lot, I have seen a lot of ups and downs including wins and losses. But I think you only learn from those experiences. From day one, my mindset has been how to improve myself," said the star player who was born into a family of farmers in Amritsar's Timmowal village and whose international career began in 2014.
A team-man to the core, Harmanpreet credited his fellow players for making it possible for him to shine individually.
"Whatever we are achieving we are achieving as a team. The journey has been very fascinating, I am getting individual recognitions and awards but only because of my teammates.
"I have enjoyed my journey a lot till date. I have put on a lot of hard work and I am happy with what I have achieved till date," he said.
The defender is now eyeing a medal in the World Cup when the event is held in Belgium next year.
"My main target of course will be the World Cup because it's been long that we haven't won a medal in World Cup. But it's not like that you have achieved everything in life," he said.
"We have won back-to-back medals in Olympics but our next target would be to win the gold and win all major tournaments. It's a step by step process and we would like to achieve our targets as a team," he said. |
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