WHILE Pakistan cricket has been facing one controversy after another — both on and off the field — since the England tour earlier this year, our hockey brigade made us all feel proud as they clinched the gold medal at the Asian Games held in Guangzhou, China, last month. Winning the prestigious continental title after a yawning gap of 20 years, our hockey players have proved that with unity, proper planning, courage, discipline and, above all, timely utilisation of teamwork a team can achieve major targets regardless of heaps of hurdles that may come in their way.

To be a bit more precise, management plays a crucial role in enabling a team to record a big victory, and so the coach, the assistant coach and the manager, along with the Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF), also deserve equal praise for the Asiad triumph.

On the contrary, our cricket management has been way too pathetic, specifically since the England tour. The Pakistan Cricket Board, its handpicked managers and other management staff members have proved to be highly incompetent in handling various issues involving cricket or national cricketers. And no doubt the results have not been encouraging, to say the least.

Our cricket team, amid random and rare wins, has faced all sorts of problems: from fixing allegations to disunity in the team, from anomalies regarding selection of the playing XI to an unprofessional approach in crunch games, it has been a story more or less crammed with failures, setbacks and disappointments.

With the World Cup 2011 looming, one hopes our cricket authorities would look into these matters seriously on an urgent basis so that the deserving Pakistan players could deliver their best in the game's showpiece event.

SHAMEELA FATIMA Karachi