ISLAMABAD: In what seems to be yet another desperate move, the Pakistan Hockey Federation on Thursday madesome significant changes in the selection committee and national team’s coaching staff — the third such change made during the two-and-a-half year tenure of incumbent PHF regime.

Legendary Olympians and former captains Hasan Sardar and Islahuddin Siddiqui have been appointed as head coach/manager and chairman of national selection committee, respectively.

Hasan will be assisted by two former captains — Mohammad Saqlain and Rehan Butt — in preparing the national team primarily for a number of events scheduled for this year — Commonwealth Games in Australia, Champions Trophy (Holland), Asia Cup (Indonesia) and the all-important World Cup to be hosted by India in December.

Hasan replaced Farhat Abbas while Saqlain and Rehan have been appointed in place of Mohammad Sarwar and Malik Shafqat.

PHF president retired Brig Khalid Sajjad Khokhar announced the appointment of new coaches and the head of selection committee during a news conference after the federation’s congress meeting held here on Thursday.

“We are giving task to this new team [of coaches and selection committee] preparing national team for the 2018 World Cup and other important events,” PHF president told the press conference.

Later speaking to Dawn, PHF secretary Shahbaz Ahmed Senior said the changes had been made to bring about improvement in hockey.

“I do agree that we have changed coaches three times during our tenure but we are making all these changes just to achieve one aim: improvement in our team’s performance,” he insisted.

Earlier during the congress meeting, the PHF management shared with the congress members the financial expenditure and other steps which they have taken so far. However, they didn’t provide hard copy of the audited accounts.

In a highly interesting development, the representatives of KP Hockey Association which had levelled serious allegations of embezzlement and mismanagement against PHF president and secretary also attended the meeting.

Though they had not been invited by the PHF for the congress meeting, according to KP association, they attended the meeting on the basis of a court order, which allowed them to attend the gathering as members of the congress.

On the other hand, PHF president and secretary gave a different version on the KP members’ participation in the meeting. Talking to Dawn, Brig Khokhar and Shahbaz Senior said when the KP members of congress reached the venue they were allowed to attend the meeting as a goodwill gesture, not on the basis of court order.

“We don’t know anything about [any] court order,” Shahbaz Senior said, adding that the audit of PHF accounts had already been conducted and the copy of audited accounts would be provided to the congress members soon.

During the congress meeting, KP Hockey Association secretary raised some questions regarding financial corruption in the PHF.

Responding to these queries, Shahbaz Senior and Brig Khohkar while denying any corruption admitted that there might have been some irregularities in the affairs of national hockey federation.

Published in Dawn, January 5th, 2018