May 25, 2006	Thursday	Rabi-us-Sani 26, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, May 24: Top officials of the Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) on Wednesday failed to turn up for a meeting of the Senate Standing Committee on Sports to avoid a grilling, a senator claimed.

Mohammad Enver Baig said that the PHF chief Tariq Kirmani and secretary Brig (Retd) Musarratullah Khan had deliberately avoided attending the meeting.

However, officially it was intimated to the committee that Musarrat was not well and that Tariq had some foreign guest and hence could not make it from Karachi.

The meeting that lasted less than an hour was to discuss Pakistan's disappointing recent performances.

Within that time, two other invitees, former Olympians Islahuddin Siddiqui and Samiullah Khan gave their suggestions for stemming the rot.

Pakistan under coach Asif Bajwa barely managed to avoid the wooden spoon at the Champions Trophy in December finishing fifth just ahead of India in the six-team competition.

To make matters worse, the side took fourth place in the World Cup qualifiers in China, a competition Pakistan were expected to win.

In this backdrop, Enver said that the PHF officials were reluctant to explain the reasons for the poor showing.

"After making such a mess of things, now they have all gone into hiding."

The PHF has been at the receiving end of the committee on quite a few occasions in the past for all the wrong reasons.

The hockey managers therefore may well have sensed what was in store this time round and hence the no-show.

But Enver stressed that the officials had to do all the explaining at the next meeting of the committee in June.

"The nation's prestige is involved and we just cannot sit back and see our hockey being ruined by the administrators."

Meanwhile, Islahuddin told the committee that Pakistan needed to focus on physical fitness of the players.

"The team is in poor physical shape and this area needs to be addressed urgently."

He warned that there will be no chance for a revival if immediate steps were not taken to rectify the situation.