Jude Menezes took over from where Siegfried Aikman left. While Aikman, who claimed his strong Indian roots, was the coach of the Jakarta Asian Games men’s hockey title, Jude Menezes has been an Olympian and a World Cupper before he emigrated to New Zealand after the 2022 World Cup in Kuala Lumpur.
Jude Menezes was an outstanding goalkeeper who represented Bharat Petroleum in domestic hockey. He also played for Tatas and Mahindra and represented Bombay in National Hockey Championship. In 1992 he made debut for India while being chosen to play against Korea in the Junior World Cup. He represents Indian diaspora being a New Zealander of Indian origin.
His brother, Peter, is an international hockey umpire.
In the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games, he was a member of the Indian team that finished seventh. Before Sydney, he accompanied Indian team to Utrecht in the Netherlands to play his first World Cup. Four years later he returned to don Indian colours in the Kuala Lumpur World Cup where India finished 10th.
He represented India in 130 internationals, including Olympics, world Cups and other tournaments. Originally from Mumbai, he has been with the Japanese women’s hockey team.
Japan has been the only team that took a point of powerful Germany in the pool games of the FIH Olympic Qualifier for women at Ranchi.
He had joined the Japanese national hockey team (women) in 2021. Before that he has been associated with the New Zealand hockey as goalkeeper coach and coached a club side in Auckland.
Jude Menezes has high hopes on this current team.
He then decided to move to New Zealand and took to coaching seriously. Besides the hosts India, Japan is the only Asian team to qualify for semis at Ranchi.
(Prabhjot Singh is a veteran journalist with over three decades of experience of 14 years with Reuters News and 30 years with The Tribune Group, covering a wide spectrum of subjects and stories. He has covered Punjab and Sikh affairs for more than three decades besides covering seven Olympics and several major sporting events and hosting TV shows.)
