Sports in Raurkela delivers the good sports personalities, who are from the colonial era, earned the fame from cricket, football, hockey, tennis and badminton. As, it is an industrial belt and there are many proletariats and bourgeoisie class residing here, there is no place in golf.
Hockey in Raurkela
Dilip Tirkey, Indian captain in hockey and deep defender Lazarus Barla started their careers in Rourkela. As, it is place for Dilip, there are many young people who dedicates their life to play hockey. Here hockey has good infrastructure. Rourkela has special hockey hostels for kids, upbringing the next generation players with some of the best amenities. It has produced a few Arjuna Awardees including Minati Mohapatra. Olympians of repute like Paralympian Roshan and Rachita Mistry are from this city.
Lazarus Barla
Lazarus Barla was born on November 4th, 1979 in Savnamara, near Sundargarh District in Odisha. He is a field hockey defender from India, who belongs to the Oraon tribe of Chota Nagpur. He made his international senior debut for the Men`s National Team in January 1998 during the test series against Germany. He represented his native country at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, where India finished in seventh place.
Dilip Tirkey
Dilip Tirkey is hailing from Sundargarh District, Odisha and he is a former Indian hockey player and his playing position was of full back. He was best known for his penalty corner hit. Dilip Tirkey was one of the most difficult defenders (because of his tight marking skill near goal post) to beat in the world. He was an ex-captain of Indian hockey team. On 22nd March 2012, he was elected unopposed to the Rajya Sabha as one of the three Biju Janata Dal (BJD) candidates to the Upper House of Indian Parliament.
Cricket in Raurkela
Indian national cricketer Sanjay Raul and the Under-19 world cup representative Chandrakant Barik are players from this city.
Chess in Raurkela
Pabitra Mohan Mohanty, the former national `B` champion in chess and second only to Viswanathan Anand in national `A` category is a resident of this city.
Stadiums in Raurkela
Raurkela has a sports hub of two stadiums and few other sports grounds located in sector-6. The two stadiums are ISPAT Stadium and a beautiful Astro-Turf hockey stadium. There is a basketball ground, a chess hall, and a well-maintained volleyball ground nearby. The indoor stadium at sector-20 hosts the badminton and Table Tennis events. Rourkela has an International hockey stadium with synthetic Astroturf which has been host to World Junior Hockey Championship and has been a training centre to most of the international Hockey players of India. ISPAT Stadium has been host for several Ranji Trophy matches. The city has produced many reputed Ranji Trophy players in the recent times.
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