PSB releases Rs3.5m grant to PHF

ISLAMABAD: As the national hockey team is to embark on tour to Holland to regain the lost glory in the Champions Trophy, Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) released the much-awaited grant of Rs 3.5 million to the Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF).

“We have received the amount from the concern ministry and have released the annual grant to the PHF. The delay in releasing the grant has nothing to do with the PSB. In fact it was the PHF that submitted the required audited documents late and that turned out to be the reason of delay,” Mohammad Azam Dar, Deputy Director General Technical PSB, said. Apart from the annual grant, the PHF has minted over Rs 500 million from the federal government during last three years without showing any positive results in recent past.

Following pathetic show in the Commonwealth Games where the Pakistan finished seventh out of ten-team competition, the greenshirts failed to qualify for the youth Olympics after getting defeated by the Malaysia with a heavy margin of 12-1. India and Malaysia went on make it to Youth global event from the Asian continent.

Now the hockey team is preparing for the concluding Champions Trophy starting in Breda (The Netherlands) from June 23. The selectors were in process of watching trails Tuesday to finalise a list of 22 players from which the final selection of 18-member team would be made after two weeks of training camp in Holland.

The PHF this time around has invested heavily on the team preparations as besides hiring expensive Roelant Oltmans as a head coach and Australian fitness coach Daniel Barry, federation is also getting record finances from the government. The Champions Trophy is considered as the last chance for the federation headed by Brig (rtd) Khalid Sajjad Khokhar to see the team performing to fans expectations of millions of fans back home.

Pakistan finished behind world’s 23rd ranked Scotland in the XXI Games on a position which turned out to be the worst ever. In absence of teams like Germany, Holland , Argentina, Belgium, Spain and even were not drawn to play the ultimate finalist New Zealand and Australia, Pakistan 7th position was poorest ever in the Commonwealth Games.

Pakistan deliberately missed the penultimate Champions Trophy held two years back more due to fear of losing rather than anything else. Though Pakistan did not qualify for that particular Trophy, FIH while showing courtesy to the services rendered by Air Marshal Nur Khan (who initiated the Trophy) offered Pakistan a wild card to compete in the event. The fear of not matching the best overcame the current PHF officials who decided against sending the team to London. Belgium seized the opportunity and from there on never looked back emerging as one of the strongest teams in the world.

On other hand, the deliberate miss proved fatal as greenshirts never recovered from that blow and consistently kept on losing their ranking to end up 14th and now 13th in the world. The team would get a chance of redemption as a good performance in the concluding Champions Trophy would help them improve their ranking. In fact the nation demands nothing less than title from the PHF to give befitting send off to the event. Since Pakistan is the proud winner of first two editions of the Trophy in late seventies, there would be no better and befitting sending off to Champions Trophy than to bring it back home.

Admitted that Pakistan never won the Trophy after 1994, still we came closer to victory as only three years back in India when Akhtar Rasool was the head of federation. Pakistan lost to Germany narrowly in the final in front of hostile Indian crowd. This time around Pakistan have all the odds in their favour. The team has experience foreign coach in Renault Oltmans who turned the Indian team into one of the world’s top outfit during the last three years. The finance for the current PHF is in abundance as the government during the last three years has doled out record grant to the federation. All the federation needs is a sincere and honest effort and the victory could be Pakistan’s this time. Besides playing India on the opening day on June 23, Pakistan are to face Australia on June 24, The Netherlands on June 26. Pakistan’s next opponent would Argentina on June 28. Pakistan’s last round robin match would be against Belgium on June 29. Positional matches including final are scheduled for July 1.Pakistan team leaves for Holland on June 2.