Purnima Yadav Picked for India Junior Asia Cup Squad

Varanasi: A hockey journey that began on the outskirts of Varanasi with a borrowed sense of possibility is heading to China. Purnima Yadav of Chakka village in Harahua has been selected as a forward in India’s under-21 women’s squad for the Junior Asia Cup, scheduled from 30 August to 13 September at the Moqi Hockey Training Base.

Purnima did not begin with a straight line to the national team. She played cricket until about the age of nine but found limited opportunity to progress. In 2016 she switched to hockey at the Olympian Vivek Singh Academy in Harahua, learning a new sport and earning selection to the sports college and hostel in Gorakhpur within roughly a year.

The family story behind the selection is as important as the team sheet. Her father, Kaushalendra Yadav, is a farmer. Her mother, Amaravati, took a bank loan of about ₹1.25 lakh to buy the kit and support Purnima’s move to Gorakhpur. In a sport where shoes, sticks, protective gear, travel and nutrition accumulate into a serious bill, that decision gave talent the equipment it needed.

Purnima is known as an attacking player who can work around the penalty circle and convert chances late in a match. Local accounts describe her drag-flicking ability and composure against goalkeepers. She has previously been part of an Indian junior group that played in an Australian league environment and has just returned from an exposure tour in the United Kingdom.

International tours are not decorative additions to preparation. They expose young players to faster ball circulation, unfamiliar umpiring rhythms, different surfaces and the discipline of recovering between matches. For a forward, small improvements in off-ball movement and decision-making can be the difference between creating a half-chance and being marked out of a game.

Her selection also reflects the value of a local academy that can spot a child beyond the city’s established institutions. Harahua is only about ten kilometres from the district headquarters, yet the distance between village sport and an India jersey is measured in coaching, travel money and repeated selection trials. Purnima’s path shows what happens when those links hold.

The Junior Asia Cup will be a demanding tournament, and selection alone should not be turned into a guarantee of playing time or medals. The squad must still complete its preparation, settle combinations and manage injuries. Purnima will be competing for a role among several selected forwards.

For Chakka village, however, the achievement is already concrete. A family loan, a change from cricket and years of hostel training have placed one of its daughters on an international roster. The most useful celebration would be to ensure the next talented girl does not have to rely on extraordinary family borrowing to obtain an ordinary hockey kit.