Leslie Claudius
Leslie Walter Claudius (born March 25, 1927 in Bilaspur , † December 20, 2012 in Calcutta ) was an Indian hockey player . With three Olympic gold medals and one Olympic silver medal, Leslie Claudius was together with his long-time teammate Udham Singh the most successful hockey player in Olympic history. At the same time, the two players are the most successful Indian Olympians.
Career
Leslie Claudius started out as a football player, he played for the Bengal Nagpur Railways team . In 1946 he was a spectator at a hockey tournament in which two teams from the Bengal Nagpur Railways were involved. During this tournament he was asked to replace an injured player surprisingly. Claudius did his job so well that he stayed on the hockey team throughout the tournament. After the tournament, Claudius switched entirely to hockey and was able to improve his technical skills within a very short time.
Dhyan Chand , the playmaker of the Indian pre-war team, discovered Claudius for the Indian national team and in 1948 Claudius was part of the Indian contingent at the Olympic Games in London. In the final, the Indian team defeated the British hosts 4-0 and continued the winning streak of the Indian hockey team, which has been going on since 1928. The Indian team was also successful with Claudius in 1952 and 1956 . This Olympic winning streak broke in 1960 when the Indian team lost to Pakistan in the final after the Indians had lost to Pakistan in the 1958 Asian Games final. After the final defeat in 1960, Claudius ended his active career.
In 1971 Claudius was honored with the Padma Shri . In the 1980s he worked for two years as a match observer for the Indian Hockey Federation, but gave up this position again because he was unable to reconcile the numerous trips with his professional activity at the customs authorities of Kolkata . Claudius was after the end of his professional activity in the Bengali arbitration commission.
Web links
- Portrait on indianet (english)
- Leslie Claudius in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
Individual evidence
- ^ Hockey legend Leslie Claudius passes away , December 20, 2012, The Hindu
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Claudius, Leslie |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Claudius, Leslie Walter (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Indian field hockey player |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 25, 1927 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Bilaspur (Chhattisgarh) |
| DATE OF DEATH | December 20, 2012 |
| Place of death | Calcutta |