Azlan Shah International Hockey Tournament - - The First Step Towards The Rebuilding of National Hockey Team for Big Events

KARACHI – The rebuilding process of Pakistan hockey team after disaster at New Delhi World Cup will formally begin here on Sunday when the selectors name trainees for the camp to be held at the HCP in preparation for coming months seven-nation 19th Azlan Shah Trophy in Malaysia.

Chief national hockey selector former Olympian Hanif Khan and his committee colleague Chaudhry Arshad, Muhammad Usman and Musaddiq Hussain are expected to name 25 to 30 or more players in consultation with the new team coach Khawaja Junaid at the end of the 57th National Hockey Championship that formally closes on Sunday (today).

The national camp is expected to begin here April 21 under the supervision of new team management announced recently.

At Azlan Shah International Hockey, Pakistan would begin the process to raise a team that will help Pakistan win the Asian Games in China in November.

For the last one and half years, the officialdom of the Pakistan Hockey Federation has repeatedly said that its main objective was Asian Games and all the other events were part of the process to raise a strong combination for China. While seeing off the World Cup squad when it left for New Delhi, the PHF president Qasim Zia had hoped that Pakistan would do well at the World Cup but at the same time he had stated that PHF’s main aim is Asian Games.

With almost 230 days left for the Asian Games to start in Guangzhou, Pakistan would be hard pressed to raise an experienced and physically fit team that would do better than the last Doha Asian Games where Pakistan finished with bronze.

The national selectors are expected to select two kinds of players for the national camp. The first kind would be experienced players who recently played at World Cup and the second would be younger and talented players who could be groomed in the shadows of the seniors as replacements for seniors in the future.