ISLAMABAD Star drag-flicker Sohail Abbas feels that Pakistan needs a foreign coach to revive their past glory by blending Asian style with European structure.

“We in Asia just go out and play on the pitch. But in Europe, you learn how much planning goes into the game. We need to play in Asian style but in European structure, a team will have to be good in everything - defending, attacking, distributing or penalty corner conversion, and the players now have multiple roles, the forwards are the first line of defence.” Sohail said.

“We were playing well coming into this tournament. We approached the world cup with a lot of confidence, but things havent fallen into place for us here.” Pakistan left- back said.

The only man in world hockey with over 300 international goals to his name, Abbas is a true legend of the game.

But he has been off colour during the quadrennial spectacle and scored only once in the tournament so far.

He however attributes this to luck, just as he does his success. “Whatever I have achieved in this game is due to the grace of Allah, I have scored many goals where I aimed in one place and the ball went into the goal, but in another direction, in the same way, I have missed a few goals this time that should have gone in, that was because Allah had not willed the ball to go in. he said.

The player himself has a clear conscience.

“I dont deliberately miss penalty corners. Sometimes they go in and sometimes they dont. I know that I always give my best on the pitch, the rest is not up to me.” He added