Charlesworth, Batra involved in war of words

Controversial Australia hockey coach Rich Charlesworth today hit back at Hockey India secretary-general Narinder Batra's stern personal criticism and said his comments about the poor crowd turn-out during the Hero Hockey World League Final was "self-evident" in the second semifinal between the two best teams of the world.
"I came to know about his (Batra's) comments now only. I think he wants patients for his hospital. What I said was self-evident because two of the best teams were playing (in the second semifinal) but there was hardly any crowd," Charlesworth told reporters reacting to Batra's personal attack that the celebrated Australian coach was a "loose cannon" and he needs "psychological treatment".

World champions Australia lost 3-4 to the Netherlands in a hard-fought second semifinal of the eight-nation tournament to crash out of the title race.
Hockey Australia chief executive Cam Vale said he would take up the matter with Hockey India after the conclusion of the tournament.
"We will be discussing the matter with HI after the conclusion of the tournament about the inappropriate comments attributed to Mr. Batra about our highly respected coach Charlesworth," Vale said.
Batra, earlier in the day, launched a scathing attack on Charlesworth, calling him a "loose cannon" after the Australian criticised the poor turnout of spectators at the HWL Final.

"I don't react to what Ric Charlesworth says because he is a loose cannon. He himself does not know what he is saying. I just ignore whatever he says. He might be a genius in hockey, but in communication skills, he is very poor. He needs to go back to school to learn basics," Batra said.
"I think he needs to learn what language one speaks when he travels to a different country. We don't react or say something bad about a country when we see poor crowd turnout. It's that country's problem. I don't take his questions and I don't answers his questions. That man needs some mental and psychological treatment," said a fuming Batra.