January 04, 2008	Friday	Zilhaj 24, 1428

KARACHI, Jan 3: Overage players experienced mixed fortunes on Thursday as the hockey selectors axed three of them while still selecting two others in the junior squad for an eight-nation tournament in Kuala Lumpur starting from Jan 17.

Shafqat Rasool, also in doubt of being overage, was retained as the team captain, while Mohammad Zubair, a discarded senior team forward, was ignored for the honour despite being the senior most player in the side.

Full-back Mohammad Atiq was shown the door for being overage although the official ground for his axing is said to be his poor show in the camp.

“Atiq has not been selected because of his bad performance during the camp,” Jahangir told reporters at Hockey Club of Pakistan, although the full-back scored quite a few goals during the training camp.

Also excluded from the junior squad was Pakistan senior team forward Abbas Haider about whom the selectors contended that he was useful for the senior team. It, however, raises the key question that why was he called for the junior camp in the first place.

Sources, however, disclosed that Abbas was not considered for selection because of suspicions about his age which prompted the player to voluntarily withdraw from the junior team.

Goalkeeper Imran Shah, a senior camp probable, also failed to get the selectors’ nod and left the camp immediately after the official announcement of the team as a mark of protest despite being named among the nine standbys.

Sources said team coach Danish Kaleem was pressing for Imran’s inclusion as the reserve goalkeeper but chief selector Khawaja Zakauddin instead threw his weight behind Khurram Butt for the tourney.

Interestingly, while Zaka and selector Samiullah succeeded in ousting three overage players without specifically saying that they had been excluded on the age criteria, they failed to convince Jahangir in doing away with two other overage players — captain Shafqat and Amir Shahzad.

Sources say although the two selectors were against including any overage player in the junior team this time, they had to compromise on Shafqat and Amir on Jahangir’s insistence. Jahangir has, however, promised to exclude the two players after the eight-nation event, the sources added.

“We have ousted three overage players. We will drop them gradually in the future. The selected players have Nadra’s national identity cards and passports, so we have to rely on those documents. But I think we should not talk about this selection anymore at the moment,” Zaka told Dawn.

Another senior team player, full-back Kashif Ali has been accommodated in the junior squad to replace Atiq. Fareed Ahmad, a promising forward, has been included in place of Zeeshan Ali, while Mohammad Imran has been dropped and is replaced by forward Rizwan Ahmad.

Promising penalty corner striker Azlan Khan, who was controversially axed on the physical trainer’s report and then recalled for the Kenya and Egypt tours last year, has been overlooked once again without any valid reason.

Squad:

Goalkeepers: Mohammad Khurram, Imran Butt.

Full-backs: Kashif Ali, Imran Abbas, Adnan Jawaid.

Half-backs: Mohammad Irfan, Zaheer Ahmad, Amir Shahzad, Fareed Ahmad, Khurram Shahzad.

Forwards: Adeel Hussain, Shafqat Rasool (captain), Inayatullah, Haseem Khan (vice-captain), Mohammad Zubair, Shahzad Nasir, Rizwan Ahmad, Mohammad Taufeeq.

Standbys: Imran Shah, Mohammad Khalid, Ejaz Ahmad, Kashif Jawaid, Usman Tariq, Sibtain Raza, Imran Malik, Zubair Jr, Azlan Khan.

Officials: Jahangir Butt (manager), Kamran Ashraf, Danish Kaleem (coaches).