Pakistani hockey legends lament loss to India

KARACHI - Pakistan’s hockey legends have lambasted the people at the helm of national hockey for the team’s “embarassing” defeat against India in the Commonwealth Games.

“The people at the helm of our hockey affairs have drowned 50 years of glory earned by us within a period of a few months,” said Shahnaz Sheikh, a former Olympian referring to the Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF), which has failed to bring any improvement in the national team’s performance.

Pakistan was thrashed 7-4 by India and crashed out of the medals race at the Games.

“We were bad at the (2008 Beijing) Olympic Games and got worse at the World Cup. Now we are even out of the medals race at the Commonwealth Games. It’s unbelievable,” Shahnaz said.

Shahnaz said that Pakistan were ill-prepared for a tournament that didn’t feature five of the world’s top teams. “Even though top teams like Germany, Holland, Spain, Korea and Argentina weren’t part of the field, our boys were unable to even reach the semifinals. It shows that in spite of spending millions (of rupees) on their training, our hockey chiefs failed to prepare a good team.”

Islahuddin Siddiqui, a former Pakistan captain, said that PHF, its coaches and players were all exposed in the defeat against India.

“In the last Commonwealth Games in 2006, we finished as silver medallists,” said Islah. “Four years later, after having spent millions on the team, we won’t even finish among the top four. Pakistan hockey has certainly touched its nadir,” Islah maintained.

He said that Pakistan failed to come out with a proper game plan. “There was a clear lack of planning on the part of our coaches,” he said. “Against Australia we were saved from similar embarrassment because our goalie played well and because the Aussies wasted almost a dozen easy chances,” he added, referring to Pakistan’s 0-1 defeat against Australia on Saturday.

“Against India, our goalie was clueless and we couldn’t do any thing because there wasn’t any reserve goalkeeper in our squad who could have replaced Imran Shah.”

Islah lamented the fact that in spite of a series of humiliating results, the higher authorities have turned a blind eye towards Pakistan hockey.

“We have hired a foreign coach, spent thousands of dollars on staging training camps but still the team continues to do

badly. I’m actually disheartened because of the fact that our prime minister, who is PHF’s chief patron, is not even interested in doing anything about it.”

Since Pakistan’s World Cup debacle last March, Islah and several other former greats have been trying to meet Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani to brief him about the plight of Pakistan hockey but have been snubbed.