Draws of national hockey C’ship today

KARACHI: Draws for the National Hockey Championship will be announced on Wednesday (today) in Rawalpindi at Mari Petroleum stadium, ‘The News’ learnt on Tuesday.

The championship will be organised from November 5 to 20 at the newly-laid blue astro turf of Mari Petroleum stadium. The matches will start from Thursday morning and four matches will be organised a day.

PHF sources said that six teams had reached Rawalpindi and the remaining four teams would reach there on Wednesday.

Tournament Director (TD) Zahir Shah will meet the technical officials and umpiring manager and brief them about the championship.

Sources said that it would not be possible to organise night matches as the floodlights have just been installed and are still not operational.

Sources said that spectators would be allowed to witness the matches with strict implementation of SOPs. The sources mentioned that sanitising walk-through gates have been installed at the stadium.

They added that PHF was making efforts to arrange prize money for the winners and runners-up.

The championship is crucial for Pakistan hockey as the players of Pakistan senior and junior teams have not played international hockey for a long time due to Covid-19 and poor ranking at international level. They have also not played any bilateral series.

Pakistan are to take part in Junior Asia Cup 2021, and Asian Champions Trophy in March 2021 in Bangladesh.