IT was a disastrous year as far as Pakistan hockey is concerned. The only point scoring was that the Green Shirts booked a passage for the 2018 World Cup, thanks to the International Hockey Federation (FIH) for raising the number of competing teams from 12 to 16.

The World Cup is slated to take place at Bhubaneswar, India, from Nov 28 to Dec 16 this year.

It is pertinent to mention that after failing to qualify for the last World Cup held at The Hague, Netherlands, in 2014, Pakistan again faced ignomity to qualify for the last year’s Rio Olympics for the first time ever as abatement continued.

The year started with Pakistan team’s twin tour to New Zealand and Australia to play Tests series against their counterparts in mid March and early April.

Pakistan won the five-Test series against the Kiwis 2-1 with two games ending in stalemate.

Pakistan lost the first Test 2-3. The second Test ended in two-all stalemate. The Green Shirts won the third 4-2 and the fourth 2-1 while the fifth and the last ended in one-all draws.

In the second leg, Pakistan suffered severe humiliation as Aussies swept the four-Test series. The Kookaburras gave a 6-2 drubbing to Pakistan in the opener. The hosts doubled their lead winning the second game 3-0. The Aussies went 3-0 up winning the third match 2-0 before rounding off the series with a 5-3 victory.

Pakistan suffered a set-back when Malaysia for the first time didn’t extended an invitation for participation in the 26th Azlan Shah Cup in April and the place was filled by Great Britain.

This reflects alleged foulplay and there’s likelihood that the same lobby was behind the one which wanted to isolate Pakistan.

Pakistan under-18 hockey team also travelled Australia in April to compete in Australian National Junior Hockey Championship at Hobart.

The visitors carved out a 3-2 victory over New South Wales State in the final to clinch the event and left a good impact.

Then came the World Hockey League in London where Pakistan suffered a debacle by finishing seventh among 10 teams. Luckily, they survived the scare of getting eliminated from the 2018 World Cup.

Drawn in Pool ‘B’ alongside Holland, India, Canada and Scotland, the Green Shirts had a disappointing start losing 0-4 to the Dutch.

Pakistan’s plight continued when they lost to minnows Canada by tennis score of 0-6 in the next match. Pakistan suffered their worst ever 1-7 defeat at the hands of India before registering a 3-1 win over Scotland.

World No 1 Argentina thrashed Pakistan 3-1 in the quarter-finals as the latter were settled to play classification matches for the 5th to 8th positions.

India, who lost their quarter-final to Malaysia 2-3, gave a 6-1 drubbing to Pakistan, their second success in the event in the 5th to 8th classification match.

Pakistan conjured up a 3-1 victory over China to seize seventh place.

Former Olympians raised hue and cry and said results are true indicator of form and fitness and the way Pakistan team lost their matches, the PHF top brass, retired Brig Khalid Sajjad Khokhar and the secretary Shahbaz Ahmed should have immediately stepped down by accepting the responsibility besides the team management but unfortunately, no soul was moved.

World number 14 Malaysia leaped 10 places by finishing fourth so did world number 11 Canada, who attained fifth spot.

Pakistan lost a three match series against Ireland 0-2 in London as the first game resulted in two-all draw on the eve of the WHL. Pakistan went down 2-3, 2-3 in the second and third games respectively.

The FIH had to apologise after it’s president Dr Narinder Dhruv Batra’s tirade against Pakistan appeared on social media following India’s defeat at the hands of Pakistan in the ICC Champions Trophy final in London on June 19.

The FIH said: “The personal thoughts of Dr Batra were not representative of the views of the FIH”.

“The FIH added the incident will be reviewed internally in line with our governance processes”.

In the aftermath of the debacles, Hassan Sardar was brought in as chief selector with Ayaz Mahmood and Mussadiq Hussain as members. Similarly, Farhat Hasan Khan was named head coach for Asia Cup with Malik Shafqat and M. Sarwar as coaches.

Captain Haseem Khan was axed and Irfan Sr was named as captain.

Then came the Asia Cup at Dhaka where Pakistan finished third among eight nations.

Pakistan thrashed Bangladesh 7-0 in pool A opener. They were held to two-all draw by Japan in the next game. The Green Shirts went down 1-3 to India in their third league match.

In super fours, Pakistan got a 2-3 drubbing at the hands of Malaysia followed by one-all draw against South Korea. In the next game India blanked Pakistan 4-0. Pakistan finally swept aside South Korea 6-3 to grab third position in the event.

Final positions: 1-India, 2-Malaysia, 3-Pakistan, 4-South Korea, 5-Japan, 6-Bangladesh, 7-China, 8-Oman.

On Oct 25, former captain Haseem Khan in a press conference called it a day from international hockey amid step-motherly treatment from selectors.

Last but not the least Pakistan finished at the bottom in a four-nation tournament held at Melbourse.

The Green Shirts suffered their worst ever 1-9 defeat at the hands of hosts Australia in the opener.

In the next fixture, they lost to Japan 1-3 followed by 2-3 loss at the hands of Kiwis.

In the classification match for third place, Pakistan for the second time lost 1-2 to minnows Japan to settle fourth.

The writing is on the wall as Pakistan team conceded 89 goals and scored 52 goals in the above competitions which reflect the lack of ability of players and fitness level.

In the process, Pakistan lost to India four times during a year.

At the outset, the PHF named Hanif Khan as camp commandant and K. M. Junaid as head coach as 74 probables were called up for the national camp on Jan six at the Abdul Sattar Edhi Stadium.

On Feb 2, the then Chief of the Naval Staff Admiral Mohammad Zakaullah inaugurated mini turf laid down by the Navy at ASE stadium.

On April 5, the PHF chief retired Brig Khalid Sajjad Khokhar announced that the PHF will introduce uniform coaching curriculum soon but it failed to see the light of the day.

Also in April, Spain and France declined PHF’s offer to play series on Pakistan soil.

Another musical concert was organised at the ASE stadium on April 29 which shows that those responsible are allegedly bent upon to destroy it.

Instead of accepting the WHL debacle, secretary Shahbaz Ahmed blasted at the team on June 30th citing that the current team lacked in intellect and temperament to win matches.

“We’ve spent Rs 50 million on national team during the past three months – three week twin tour of Australia and New Zealand and 15-day Ireland trip,” he remarked.

In July the PHF approached the Army for providing security to World XI in January.

In Sept, development squad was sent to Oman where it won five-match series 3-0.

Manzoor Jr. 5s won five-a-side under-19 tournament played at the Islahuddin-Dr Mohammad Ali Shah Stadium.

Shabbir Sharif 9ners won the Nishan-i-Haider 9ners hockey tournament which featured 11 low-profile goal-keepers – seven from Australia and four from Argentina in Karachi. The event was sort of a festival and the PHF brought staff from Lahore to organise it.

The Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah approved a hefty sum of Rs100 million for the promotion of game besides assuring the PHF hierarchy to revamp ASE stadium.

The secretary of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Hockey Association Syed Zahir Shah turned out to be the strong critic of the PHF during the year besides several former Olympians and internationals who demanded resignation of the incumbent PHF officials..

The Peshawar High Court summoned PHF officials following a writ petition filed by Shah for alleged financial mismanagement in the PHF accounts.

He alleged that the PHF had received Rs440 million during three-years from the federal government, off which Rs 220 million were withdrawn in hard cash from Habib Bank branches in Karachi and Lahore which is clear violation of PHF constitution.

The PHF constitution, according to him, say that the amount exceeding to Rs100,000 must be withdrawn through cross cheque.

He further alleged that Rs120 million were withdrawn when the PHF chief was away for five months for treatment.

The PHF, however, denied the allegations.

Sindh Rangers XI won Inter-district hockey title by getting the better of Karachi West 2-1 in the final played at the KHA Hockey Complex.

The DG Sindh Rangers, who graced the final, awarded Rs 500,000 to the winners and Rs250,000 to runners-up besides several other prizes.

It was the richest-ever domestic hockey tournament in which Rangers doled out over Rs1.5 million.

WOMEN’S HOCKEY

Lahore Lions won the women’s hockey league defeating Quetta Panthers 2-0 as Karachi Dolphins finished third.

Syeda Sadia leveled sexual harrasment allegations against chief coach Saeed Khan in the camp at Lahore that was set-up in preparation for three -nation Asia Challenge Cup at Brunei in Oct.

Another player Iqra, who was selected in the team, came in support of Sadia and was subsequently dropped from the team.

Hockey fraternity alleged that the career of poor players was ruined as the matter was put under the carpet.

Published in Dawn, January 1st, 2018