The recently concluded Sultan Azlan Shah Hockey tournament lost much of its lustre when the world's top three hockey-playing nations —Germany, Australia and the Netherlands — did not participate in the event. What was worse was that, despite their absence Pakistan managed to perform badly. Once Olympic and World Cup champions, it finished fourth in the five-nation tournament.
Pre-tournament favourites New Zealand defeated Pakistan 3-2 in the single league and then cemented its supremacy in the play-off for third position by 2-1. Pakistan suffered an initial setback when it lost its opening match to host Malaysia (2-3) which was followed by defeat against New Zealand. However, after two successive defeats the green shirts registered a convincing 4-0 victory over Egypt with a hat-trick by seasoned attacker Shakeel Abbasi. But Pakistan's place in the final depended largely on their match against India; the latter won the match and made it to the final of the tournament.
The fact that Pakistan just managed one victory and that too against 20th ranked Egypt indicates that Pakistan hockey is on the decline despite tall claims by team management regarding rebuilding of the squad for the upcoming Asia Cup and the World Cup in 2010.
The disappointing performance in Azlan Shah Cup is a concern for impartial observers who were hoping that under the new set up of the Pakistan Hockey Federation, headed by former Olympian fullback Qasim Zia, the team would perform better. The dismal performance is even more alarming since it comes at the eve of the eight-nation Asia Cup scheduled in Kuantan (Malaysia). The winners will qualify for the next year's World Cup which is to be held in New Delhi.
Nine months ago in Beijing Games, Pakistan gave its worst-ever performance in its Olympic history by finishing eighth in the12-nation tournament. This was when the former federal sports minister had replaced Khalid Mahmood and appointed former Olympian Asif Bajwa as the PHF secretary when the Beijing Olympic was hardly six weeks away. Under the new team management, Bajwa is the PHF secretary as well as manager and Shahid Ali Khan, the coach. But the hockey circle believes that appointing Bajwa as Pakistan team manager was not a good idea even if it was a unanimous decision of the federation meeting. We may have the example of PHF secretary/manager Brig (Retd.) Manzoor Hussain Atif who helped Pakistan regain the Olympic title for the third and last time in 1984 in Los Angles. But we need to remember that Atif belonged to the golden era of our hockey and he had several world class players in the team, which we now lack.
It is high time that the PHF reviews its decision of giving the PHF secretary an additional post of team manager. Such a scenario weakens the coach's position since the players look towards their manager who carries great power but no accountability.
