India at Sydney, Australia Olympics 2000
Introduction
India shares a long history in the Olympics. India first participated at the Olympics in the year 1900 as a colonial nation with a lone athlete Norman Pritchard who won two silver medals, both in athletics and India became the first-ever Asian nation to win an Olympic medal.
India first sent its team to the Olympics in the year 1920 and has taken part in every Olympic game since then.
India has won 28 medals till now which includes 8 gold medals in hockey. Indian hockey has dominated the Olympics for more than 60 years.
India at Sydney Olympics
Sydney Olympics was memorable in many ways, there were historical moments that happened which have their unremovable prints on the history of the Olympics for India.
A delegation of 65 athletes was sent to the Sydney 2000 Olympics, 21 female and 44 male athletes for various 13 events.
India won 1 medal in total in the Sydney Olympics, and that medal was legendary in many ways. Indian hockey team, on the other hand, had to face a heartbreaking loss when they lost their place in the semifinals.
Karnam’s Historic Victory and an Unfortunate Defeat of Indian Hockey Team
Padma Shri Karnam Malleswari was the first Indian female athlete ever to win an Olympic medal in the history of India’s Olympic participation. She had previously won gold and silver medals for India at the World Championships but no woman had ever won an Olympic medal for India before.
She lifted 110 kg in the snatch. She started with 125 kg and then lifted 130 kg in the clean and jerk. It was incredible, but she wanted to do more, but just because of her coach’s miscalculation she had to attempt to lift 137.5kg in her last attempt, but she could not do it, no matter how hard she tried.
Malleshwari finished third and became the first-ever Indian woman to win an Olympic medal for her nation.
As for the Indian hockey team, before the 2000 Olympics, the team had not won any medal at the Olympics for at least two decades. Before the match began, India was looking like a very strong competitor to be on the podium, if not in the gold medal.
India had just won a tournament in Australia a month previously and had also defeated Australia, the greatest team at the time. Throughout the tournament, India has displayed some incredible hockey skills. All India had to do was beat a poor-performing team, finish the game, and go to the semi-finals.
To make its place in the semifinals India needed to score just one goal against the polish team. The majority of India’s attackers were in the opposition half as they looked for that one goal to seal the job. Everything changed in a couple of seconds. Dhanraj Pillay unleashed a powerful strike on the Polish goal. When the ball struck the goalkeeper’s pad, the rebound nearly flew 50 meters to the left. It was grabbed by a Polish midfielder, who squared it across the pitch. The Indian midfielder should have easily intercepted the pass, but fate had it that he stumbled.
The ball was gathered by a Polish player, who fired a rapid strike towards the Indian goal from the edge of the circle, and the ball went in. On the Polish side, there are celebrations, but on the Indian side, there was heartbreak. The Olympic dream had come to an end.