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| May 24, 2003 | Saturday | Rabi-ul-Awwal 21,1424 |
Pakistan to do well in penalty corner conversions: Tahir
LAHORE, May 23: Pakistan hockey coach Tahir Zaman has said that the team would do well in converting penalty corners in Australia despite the absence of Sohail Abbas.
Talking to reporters before the team’s departure for the back to back tournaments in Australia on Friday, Tahir said that there was no replacement for Sohail but a lot of hard work was done on Ali Raza, Zeeshan Ashraf and Ghazanfar Ali during the training camp and the team management expect them to deliver.
“We have worked hard to score goals through penalty corners but also emphasised on to further improve the field goal scoring rate,” Tahir said.
Tahir said that there was no pressure of playing India, one of the three teams participating in the Australia’s tournaments. He admitted that India had much experienced players as compared to Pakistan, but now fitness of a player was most important in this fast game.
Captain Ahmad hoped that the team was a blend of youth and experience and would perform well.
Manager Shahnaz said that the team needed to improve in getting command in off-the-ball play and should do better in converting chances into goals.
Shahnaz said that various shortcomings noticed during the Azlan Shah Cup had been removed and special attention was paid during the camp not to concede good number of short corners. He said that during the last Azlan Cup Pakistan conceded 23 short corners but thanked God only three were converted.
PHF secreteary Brig Musarrat Ullah Khan said that Sohail, Waseem Ahmad and Mohammad Nadeem had set a bad example and claimed that PHF had never refused player’s desire to go abroad for playing hockey and earn money.
The team is leaving for Australia via Thailand-Singapore in the small hours of Saturday to play first tournament in Perth scheduled to be held from May 28 to June 1. The second three- nation will be played at Sydney from June 4 to 8. Besides, India and Pakistan, the Australians are fielding two teams, its national and “A”.
APP adds: Pakistan’s goal-keeping coach Shahid Ali Khan said on Friday that team skipper Ahmed Alam will play a vital role in the green shirts’ quest for glory in the forthcoming tour of Australia.
Shahid, who is accompanying an 18-member national hockey squad to Perth and Sydney for twin three-nation tournaments, said Ahmed will have to deliver if his team wants to do well down under.
Shahid said that in modern day hockey goalkeepers play a vital part in a team’s performance.
“In today’s fast hockey, it is the goalkeeper that can mostly be the difference between two competing teams. If he plays well, the teams delivers and if he fails then the entire team falls apart,” he said.
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