Committee formed to probe hockey team’s failure

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) president Brig (r) Khalid Sajjad Khokhar has constituted a three-member fact-finding committee on the national team’s failure to earn a place in a group of 16 teams that qualified for the World Cup to be held in India in January 2023.

Pakistan played a draw against India and lost to Japan in an important last Pool match to go out of the Asia Cup Super-Four competition. The committee formed to analyze the failure will be headed by former Olympian Kaleemullah and include former international Nasir Ali and KPK Hockey Association president Zahir Shah.

The body has been given June 20 deadline to finalize the report after conducting interviews with the team management and leading players.

Talking to ‘The News’ here in Islamabad Sunday, Khokhar said that the committee has been formed to reach the truth as to what happened that robbed Pakistan of a place in the last four of the Asia Cup.

“We are former world champions and fielded a team that was capable of making it to the last four. Why the team has lost against Japan in a match that we should have won. We were well prepared to take on the best of teams and even have shown our strength in patches by totally dominating the last quarters. What went wrong when two goals were disallowed and why no serious efforts were made by accompanying management to take up the matter more resolutely. The committee has been empowered to ink concrete measures helping the federation to improve competitive element within the national team ranks.”

The PHF president was upset at the national team’s failure to earn a place in the Asia Cup’s last-four stage.

“It is really upsetting to see Pakistan going out of the World Cup. Every Pakistani hockey lover is upset at not finding his team in the company of the top 16 for the world.”

The PHF official at the same was unhappy with the multinationals and the previous government’s attitude towards the game which contributed a lot to the team’s failure to make it to the last-four stage of the Asia Cup.

“The game of hockey has been struggling for survival more due to absolutely no financial assistance from the previous government. It is a game that largely depends on support from the federal government and from multinationals. Sadly neither the previous government nor any sponsor had come forward in a big way to help the game stand on its feet.”

The worst was disbanding the departmental hockey teams that dented the very base of the system in the country.

“All those who had the obligation to contribute and support hockey fell short of their responsibilities, forcing the PHF to pull out of the first pro league. Since the PHF at that point in time didn’t have enough resources to meet the traveling expenses, we had to pull out of the League at the last minute. No international exposure on regular bases means fall in standard and that was exactly what happened with the Pakistan team. We know well how we managed the European tour last month. Yet, I think it was too little too late. Still, Pakistan was strong enough to make it to the last-four stage of the Asia Cup.”

The committee has been given the mandate to suggest ways and means to improve the game’s plight at all levels.