A few years back during lockdown, a unique scene played out at the Siwach household. Four members of the family -- mother, father, son and daughter -- went to the nearby small open area and started knocking the ball to each other with their hockey sticks. The mother, Pritam Siwach, is a former India captain. Kuldeep, the father, is also a former player and state-level coach. The son, Yashdeep, is now playing for the senior Indian team. The daughter Kanika has played for the juniors and looks destined to make the national team.
It's an out-an-out hockey family. If all four are at home, they watch the matches together. The dinner table conversations are almost always about the sport. When the kids are playing, the parents watch their matches to analyse and later share their notes. Sometimes, there are even not-so-serious fights between them because of hockey.
Since the parents were associated with the sport for a long time, one may assume that they also pushed their children into taking up the same sport. But Pritam and Kuldeep didn't do that. More than their parents' career, it was hockey itself that attracted the children.
"My mother, from the beginning, told me to follow my heart and just enjoy.... whether I wanted to study or play sports. But in the end, hockey is in my blood. I have played various sports but from 2015, I started taking hockey seriously. It became so interesting that I couldn't come out of it," Yashdeep, who is 24 now and playing for India in the ongoing FIH Pro League, tells ESPN.
Yashdeep remembers the moments that made him fall for the sport. One was a sub-junior national tournament where his father was the coach of the Haryana team. Even though his parents spoke a lot about hockey at home, the moment he saw a live match, he fell in love. Another instance was when the Indian team was practicing at the national stadium in Delhi. He saw the training sessions and was taken over by the 'spirit and hard work' of the players.
The love towards the sport has to come naturally. Pritam, who's an Arjuna and a Dronacharya award winner, was clear that her children should discover their own path. More importantly for her, they should enjoy and have fun.
"As a parent, I told them to do their own thing. I gave them the freedom to choose, and I never told them not to play hockey. I made them play all sports, from swimming to horse riding. They shouldn't feel that I put pressure on them to play just hockey," says Pritam.
She added that her children deserve appreciation for creating their own journey despite facing external pressure because of her own legacy. "Everybody will compare my children with me. They might say, 'he's Pritam's child, so he's here because of recommendation'. They have a lot of pressure, but I told them not to take the pressure, if you're good enough, you'll play. And I appreciate them that they have reached a certain level facing that pressure."
After her playing career, which included the Commonwealth Games gold medal in 2002, Pritam, along with Kuldeep, started a very successful academy which nurtured many past and current players. At the recent Hockey India League, there were as many as 12 players who belonged to her academy, including the likes of India internationals Neha Goyal, Sharmila Devi, Jyoti, and Nisha.
Handling pressure is also one of the most important lessons she teaches her students in the academy. She doesn't want her students to come in with an idea of making hockey as a career option, she wants them to play for the joy they have for the sport.
"Don't try to make the sport your career. Keep the sport as your entertainment. If you do that, you'll automatically play well. You see foreign players, they do it for their own entertainment, not thinking about careers. I believe and I tell the same thing to my academy students that it's important to study and play sports for entertainment. If you take pressure, you won't become a good player," she says.
The pressure part doesn't affect Yashdeep, but he does often think about his mother's achievements. It's something that he's taking as an inspiration as well as a benchmark. "My mother has achieved so much, why can't we do it and make her proud? I keep saying the same thing to my sister as well. She did so much, the least we can do is to give our 100 percent."
The fighting spirit of his parents is what Yashdeep considers as his biggest inheritance. When his mother decided to become a hockey player, she faced a lot of resistance, even from her own family. When his parents wanted to start their academy in Sonepat, they didn't have a lot of help. They faced financial, administrative and equipment issues, but they never gave up. "They don't worry about results, they put in everything. They all go in. That's my biggest learning from my parents and coaches."
There's one area though where Yashdeep is vastly different from his mother, and more like his father. It's on the field. As a player, he's a defender while Pritam was an aggressive and skilful striker who loved scoring the goals.
When he took up the sport, Yashdeep never wanted to become a goal-scorer, he was always interested in feeding the ball to his fellow teammates. Just like his father who played as a midfielder and liked to control the proceedings and make assists. "Even when I watch football matches, I like players who are defenders and those who make the assists. From the beginning, I was interested only in defence," says Yashdeep.
His mother sees more of her game in her daughter who's also a forward. "Meh aage fighter thi, mujhe goal chahiye tha chahe kuch bhi hojaye (I was a fighter up front, I needed to score goals at all costs.) Maybe I see that in my daughter, to play forward and to score goals."
Now that they are making their mark in the national teams, both parents want Yashdeep and Kanika to focus on experiencing the highs and the lows that comes with representing India. Their ultimate goal is to win Olympic medals, but the focus is always on the present, like their parents told them to. "They us to experience the sport completely. They did it and now they want us to do it -- all the different feelings when your team does well and when it doesn't," says Yashdeep.