LAHORE: After relieving Mohammad Saqlain of his duties as national team’s assistant coach in the backdrop of his altercation with manager-cum-head coach Hasan Sardar during Pakistan’s Asian Champions Trophy match against India last Saturday, the Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) has contacted former Olympian Tauqir Dar to join the team as head coach for this year’s World Cup being held in India in December.

Sources told Dawn on Monday that PHF secretary Shahbaz Senior had contacted Tauqir after receiving recommendation from manager Hasan that he wanted to have Tauqir as head coach.

The post of Pakistan’s head coach had been vacant after Dutch coach Roelant Oltmans resigned following this year’s Asian Games staged in Jakarta. As the ongoing Asian Champions Trophy was around the corner the PHF gave the additional charge of head coach to Hasan — besides retaining him as team manager — and included Rehan Butt and Saqlain as his assistants.

The 54-year-old Tauqir, who has been running his own Dar Academy in Lahore since 2007 free of charge without receiving any grant from government or the PHF, never showed any interest to work with the PHF in the past.

But new development emerged when Hasan reckoned that he (Dar) is the best available choice as national team coach.

Though, Tauqir himself was not available to confirm the development but sources said he could not refuse the offer if his name was recommended by Hasan, his colleague during the playing days. Both Hasan and Tauqir were the members of Pakistan team, which won the gold medal at the 1984 Los Angeles Games, the last time green-shirts clinched the Olympic title.

Meanwhile, Hasan in a video message slammed Saqlain alleging that during the important Asian Champions Trophy match against India, he (Hasan) asked Saqlain not to use hot words against the Pakistan players after India had equalised 1-1 before finally winning the match 3-1.

“When I tried to stop him [Saqlain] from abusing the players he used harsh words against me too following which I removed him from the coaching assignment and referred the case to the PHF for disciplinary action after further inquiry,” Hasan said in the video.

“Saqlain’s discipline record has never been exemplary as the PHF suspended him thrice in the past. The federation again gave him chance hoping for better attitude from him but he again repeated the same [this time],” Hasan added.

Saqlain, in the meantime, had returned to Islamabad where he met PHF president Khalid Sajjad Khokhar.

Published in Dawn, October 23rd, 2018

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