12 February 2004	Thursday	20 Zilhaj 1424

LAHORE, Feb 11: Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) has decided, against the policy of its Dutch coach, to consider an exhibition match to be played in connection with Brig Atif golden jubilee celebrations , to be a trial match to select a team for next month's Olympics qualifying round at Madrid, Spain.

Roelant Oltmans had said earlier that he would pick an 18-member team from the 21 probables who were training at the camp at National Stadium. "Each session of the camp is a trial for me," he had said.

PHF has invited all national selection committee members to see the match on Feb 15 between the probables of national training camp and old stars at National Stadium.

The decision to judge the performance of probables making their comparison with retired players like Rana Mujahid, Shahbaz Senior, Shahbaz Junior, Kamran Ashraf, Irfan Mahmood, Shafqat Malik, Khwaja Junaid and Tahir Zaman for the selection of Pakistan team looks unfair.

If qualified for Athens Olympics, Pakistan will play 16 matches in Holland, Germany and Spain before competing in the Olympics.

Meanwhile, Punjab Hockey Association (PHA) executive committee has suspended seven affiliated districts for six months over failure to organize Inter-club championship in 2002 and 2003.

The suspended districts are: Faisalabad, Jhelum, Kasur, Layyah, Rawalpindi, Rajanpur and Toba Tek Singh. The executive committee instructed all its affiliated districts to complete Inter-club championship in three months by holding a match a week.