Marauding Mahendran was a death sentence for goalies. Even now, at age 75, he’s still awe-inspiring. Maybe it’s because he’s a six-footer still built like a robust raider.

Creative weapon Ow sprayed passes around the pitch with aplomb and knew the perfect moment to pull out a pin-point pass to get his team in on goal.

Hockey fans loved their talent and daring in tearing defences apart in the 1970s and early 80s.

Tonight, television documentary “We Were Champions” will project their remarkable feats and backstories, promoting the togetherness and ethos of the sporting heroes as an expression of the best aspects of Malaysian sport.

As young, raw, players they gave it a go. As elite players, they carried an exciting threat and were tenacious, aggressive, and brought energy to the sport.

Born in Sungai Bakap, Penang, Mahendran, the second of 10 children, was introduced to hockey by his cousin sisters at the age of eight.

The girls, Sakuntala, Molly and Santa, who were national hockey players, dragged him along during their training and taught him the basics.

It was a family of hockey stars and incidentally, Mahendran’s brothers Devendran, Subramaniam, Surendran, Suriaprakash and nephew Edwin Lambert also represented Malaysia.

At the age of 17, while playing for Kedah Indians in Alor Setar, where his family had moved to, Mahendran was on the radar of the Malaysia Hockey Federation (MHF).

His father gave him 5 dollars and put him on a bus to attend national trials at the police depot in Kuala Lumpur. A star was in the making.

Ow, on the other hand had a terrible beginning in hockey. When he was in Standard 5, Francis Light school in Penang had trials for its hockey team and every student was handed a hockey stick and told to take a hit.

“I missed the ball because that was the first time I had held a hockey stick and I was immediately waved away,” Ow said.

At 13, he joined Penang Free School, the then bastion of hockey excellence in the state but this time he did not have a proper hockey stick.

“One day, while playing with my brother’s broken stick that was glued together, it completely broke.

“Since my family was poor and could not afford a new one, my father repaired the broken stick by gluing and nailing it together,” Ow said.

He later got a new stick and under the tutelage of his hockey master N Vellupillay, Ow became a first-choice player.

In 2012, he built an indoor hockey court at Penang Free School and dedicated it to Vellupillay “from whom began my commitment for hockey.”

Over at the national trials in Kuala Lumpur, Mahendran quickly adapted to the tough training regime of the late super coach Lawrence Van Huizen, whom he described as an “enforcer”.

He played his first international in the pre-Olympic tournament at the age of 20, but despite his remarkable performance, he was dropped from the final squad to the 1968 Mexico Olympics.

Mahendran was distraught. “I wanted to quit because being a kampung boy it was a big thing for me to go to the Olympics but my father was against it.”

In 1971, Ow sat for his MCE examination, but his obsession with hockey severely affected his studies. He failed.

“I was training on my own on the eve of the exams, and was on the field again after each paper,” he said.

To find time to play hockey, he worked several jobs including being a waiter and a “Milo boy” earning RM6 a day.

“If you ask me whether I did the right thing by sacrificing my studies, I’m still not sure,” said Ow whose two sons, Darren and Julian are doctors while the eldest son, Sean, is in the financial sector.

In 1972, Mahendran was in the first 11 to the Munich Olympics. “For all my efforts, it was time to show off.”

Mahendran was at his lethal best on grass, plundering eight goals, a hattrick coming in the opening 3-1 win over Uganda. No Malaysian player has since matched his goal haul at the Olympics.

His stellar performance helped Malaysia finish a commendable eighth at the Olympics and in the same year, he was voted National Sportsman of the Year – the first and only hockey player to win it.

When Ow joined the national team in 1973, he looked up to Mahendran for motivation and they have remained good friends until today.

After securing a job as a fireman with Penang Port Commission (PPC), Ow got his first chance to play alongside Mahendran at the 1974 Teheran Asian Games where Malaysia won the bronze medal.

Then, he had to choose between going with the national team on a tour of Europe in preparation for the 1975 World Cup in Kuala Lumpur or to re-sit the MCE examination.

“I decided to take the examination on the advice of Othman Kamal, my boss and mentor at PPC, and missed the opportunity to be part of one of the best Malaysian hockey teams,” he said.

Ow said he was happy that he got his MCE certificate and was able to later join the police as an inspector.

Emotions of a lifetime rattled through the minds of the ’75 World Cup team on March 11 at the Kilat Club ground as Malaysia beat The Netherlands 2-1 to make the semi-finals.

Mahendran said days like that were priceless in sport as the crowd came together as Malaysians.

“There was no colour, no religion, and everything was about being Malaysian. I rarely see that happening now,” he added.

Malaysia lost the semi-final 3-2 after extra time to India and were defeated by West Germany 4-0 in the play-off for the third and fourth place.

The ultimate aim of Ow was to play in the Olympics and together with Mahendran he helped Malaysia finish eighth in the 1976 Montreal Olympics where the age of playing on artificial surface began.

A year later, Ow was torn between filial duty and service to the nation when his father, Ow Song Teik, died in Penang days before the hockey final against Singapore at the Sea Games in Kuala Lumpur.

Telling his brother that the Malaysian team needed his services, Ow returned to play in the final and helped the country win gold.

In 1978, he played in his first World Cup in Argentina and in the following year he was made captain of the national team, and for three consecutive years from 1979 he was voted Malaysian hockey player of the year.

In 1983, he retired from hockey but was asked to come back for the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics.

The kid who started out with a broken hockey stick and failed his MCE examination because of the sport, played in two Olympics, two World Cups, Asian Games, Sea Games and countless other international tournaments.

He was captain of the national team for four years and would have been a triple Olympian had Malaysia not boycotted the Moscow Olympics in 1980.

Mahendran retired in 1980 after having played 13 years for the country: two Olympics, three World Cups, Asian Games, Sea Games and numerous international tournaments.

Mahendran earned 179 national caps while Ow made over 100 appearance at a time when earning a cap meant playing a full game and when the game did not have rolling substitutions.

They are from that generation who have put so much back into the sport, with Ow being a spearhead for junior development.

Mahendran, who has coached the national teams of Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand, still plays for the Malaysian veterans hockey team and trains children.

“To give back to hockey is like a calling for me. Hockey is like a religion to me,” said Ow, 67, who is a partner and director with Waz Lian Group of companies and a trustee of Waz Lian Foundation.

The fourth episode of “We Were Champions” featuring M Mahendran and Ow Soon Kooi will be aired tonight at 10.30pm tonight on Sukan RTM Channel 111 Myfreeview.