1932 Olympics-Los Angeles, USA

JPEG Image"Tokyo is a truly modern city. The Hotel Manpi where we stayed was clean and comfortable. The hotel attendants were all pretty Japanese girls. Naturally the members of the team were all excited, and Pankaj Gupta had great difficulty in restraining his wards to keep within bounds"

1932 Indian Olympic Hockey team
Goalkeeper: Allen
Backs: Tapsell and Hammond
Half-Backs: Masud Minhas, Pinniger and Lal Shah
Forwards: Dickie Carr, Gurmit Singh, Dhyan Chand, Roop Singh and Jaffar

In the 1932 Summer Olympics held at Los Angeles, USA, the team under Lal Shah Bukhari defended their title winning the gold. The team routed the United States hockey team 24-1, a record that exists till today. The funny part is that, USA managed to score only one goal against India and that too because Indian goolkeeper "ALLEN" was busy giving autographs to the fans. Dhyan Chand contributed eight of those goals, and along with his brother Roop Singh formed a formidable core of the team. He scored 12 goals in India's two matches in that Olympics and he had scored 133 goals out of India's 338 in that year.

India played their first match on August 4th 1932 against Japan. As anticipated, they won easily, by 11 goals to 1. On August 11, India met the United States in the deciding match of the tournament. It was a cakewalk for India, and former won by 24 goals to 1. Certain American newspapers had suggested that in order to make it a contest, the Indians ought to play left-handed or wear snow shoes. At the interval India were leading by 10 goals to nil. The 24 goals India ended up scoring was a world record. Dhyan Chand scored 8, Roop Singh 10, Gurmit Singh 5 and Pinniger 1. The lone American goal was scored by Bodlington.

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The 1932 Olympics and post Olympics statics are as follows:-
Total Matches -37
Goals For India- 338
Goals Against India- 34
Dhyan Chand - 133
Roop Singh - 94
Gurmit Singh - 55
R. J. Carr - 29
S. M. Jaffar - 18
Eric Pinniger - 5
Masud Minhas - 3
Sullivan - 1

Sankalp Unit