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| Pakistan pull out of India hockey tour a bit too late |
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Saturday, January 03, 2009
By Khalid Hussain
KARACHI: National sports authorities on Friday announced that they have decided to block Pakistan hockey team’s visit of India to play in a four-nation tournament there.
But their decision has perhaps come a little too late.
Because India had already decided a couple of days back to replace Pakistan with New Zealand in the quadrangular double-header to be played from January 31 to February 9 in Chandigarh and Jalandhar.
India had made their plans over seeking Pakistan’s replacement for the four-nation event weeks ago but the Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) was either unaware of it or simply decided to ignore news that has been coming from across the border over the last several days.
They kept on saying that the concerned authorities will decide the fate of the Indian tour though it was apparent that the ad-hoc committee of the Indian Hockey Federation had lost interest in Pakistan soon after the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai.
Media reports coming from India had suggested that the country’s hockey officials were looking for a team that could replace Pakistan in the quadrangular event that will be featuring world and Olympic champions Germany, Holland and hosts India. They had approached several teams including the 2004 Athens Games champions Australia. In the end it was New Zealand, who accepted the Indian invitation.
The decision to drop Pakistan and replace them with New Zealand was taken by the Indian hockey officials earlier this week. But so uniformed were the PHF officials that even on Friday morning, the federation’s president Qasim Zia had said that the PHF is awaiting government’s clearance for the tour of India.
Such a naive behaviour doesn’t augur well for the PHF top brass that has been making tall claims about reviving the glory days of Pakistan hockey.
One cannot blame Qasim Zia for being ignorant about the situation as he is a full-time politician who is just heading the PHF because of his love for hockey and the fact that he is a former Olympian.
But one cannot ignore the fact that the PHF currently has a team of paid officials including its secretary Asif Bajwa, who has been occupying the key PHF post since last July. Bajwa, also a former Olympian, has been globe-trotting for the last several months and claims to be in constant touch with Indian hockey officials as he has been meeting them in places like Los Angeles and Kuala Lumpur. It was his duty to be fully informed about what was going on regarding the four-nation tournament.
Had he been aware of India’s plans to axe from Pakistan the quadrangular, Pakistani sports authorities would have pulled out of the event a long time ago and our sports authorities wouldn’t have looked this foolish.
Because Pakistan’s decision to pull out of the Indian event was only announced Friday afternoon after a foreign news agency released the news that New Zealand have been included in the tournament as Pakistan’s replacement.
The double-header in India was supposed to serve as a launch pad for Pakistan’s Asia Cup preparations. Pakistan have to win the Asia Cup — to be played in May in Dubai — to directly qualify for the 2010 World Cup. But so far their Asia Cup plans seem to be in disarray as the PHF is yet to even put the national team management in place.
It has also failed to line up a training programme for what is easily the national team’s most important assignment this year.
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ISSN 1563-9479 
