Facilities provided to boxers at national camp below standard

LAHORE: National boxers who aim to press for the Paris Olympics seats need to stay at a decent hostel which would boost their motivation level ahead of Olympics Qualifiers in the next few months.

This correspondent on Friday visited the Railways Stadium and found the overall facilities below standard which will affect the growth and preparation of the boxers.

The authorities will need to accommodate the pugilists at such a centre where they could get the best facilities around. It will be of high value if the fighers are shifted to either the PSB Coaching Centre Lahore or WAPDA Sports Complex where they will find decent training and boarding environment as compared to the Railways Sports Complex here in Garhi Shahu.

“Yes it would be of high value if we got better facilities off the pitch also,” a boxer in the camp told The News in an informal chat. “Definitely when you live at a good place it contributes to your motivation level and you feel strong. It will be great if both on the pitch and off the pitch things are fine,” the boxer said. This correspondent saw that three boxers had reported for the camp: the Asian bronze medallist Zohaib Rasheed, Areeba and super heavyweight fighter Azhar, the brother of former Pakistan’s solid fighter Ahmed Ali. Azhar is yet to feature in international events.

“The rest of the boxers will reach here in the next few days,” Pakistan’s coach and former Olympian Arshad Hussain told ‘The News’ in an informal chat.

The PBF has invited over a dozen boxers for the camp which started with the boxers undergoing physical training on Friday. Tariq Siddiqui is working alongside Arshad.

The national fighters will be featuring in the World Qualifying rounds to be held in Italy from February 29 to March 12 and in Bangkok from May 23 to June 5. The Hangzhou Asian Games recently held were also a qualifying round for boxing but there national fighters failed to advance beyond the quarter-finals.

Former world bronze medallist Nouman Karim, who was also present on the occasion, told this correspondent that Pakistani lot has the potential but it will be of high value to give them at least one month training in Thailand.

“No doubt Pakistan has some good fighters and Zohaib Rasheed is one of them but they will need a foreign training tour. I would suggest that Thailand would be an ideal destination for training. The training tour should be arranged in such a manner that the fighters could return and in four or five days could leave for Italy for the Qualifiers,” Nouman said.

“Without a training tour it will be difficult for the fighters to impress at the highest level,” he said. Besides Zohaib, Qasim, Ibrahim and Ilyas Hussain are the fighters who can impress in the Qualifiers.