Bhubaneswar: After Beligum lifted the Odisha Men’s Hockey World Cup, stories about the team’s midnight escapade from hotel to Kalinga Stadium in 2017 by breaching security cover ‘as part of some superstitious ritual’ is doing rounds again. The Belgium captain, however, has brushed them aside as something funny that the entire team wanted to do.

It is during the World Hockey League last year that the Belgium team after dodging the security cover at their hotel managed to enter the Kalinga Stadium. However, they were prevented by the security guard who immediately alerted police. Various media houses had reported the incident which sparked speculations that the Belgians could have been trying to perform some rituals at the Stadium.

Belgium hockey team captain Thomas Briels admitted the fact that the team had tried to sneak into the Kalinga Stadium during midnight.

“It was a pretty fun experience (last year) for us but the security was not happy with us and it was more of a team bonding thing. We had lost to India in the quarterfinals and it was a tough loss for the team. We knew that exactly after one year, we would be playing the World Cup here at Kalinga Stadium,” said Briels.

Briels further said that between the days the team went to Kalinga Stadium and now, we can say that it really worked well for us as we won the world cup this year.

Another Belgium team player said “It was not really a tradition or a superstition, we were really disappointed and we wanted do something that we would remember after one year.” The Belgium players further admitted that it was just a little adventure last year.