LAHORE: Former secretary of the Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) Asif Bajwa on Wednesday slammed the selection of 37 players for the national camp being set up in Islamabad from May 4 for the Asian Games.

Bajwa expressed surprise that the six players who were part of the last Asian Champions Trophy winning team were not selected for the camp.

They are Amir Shehzad, Kashif Shah, Faisal Qadir, Amad Shakeel Butt, Mohammad Suleman and Mohammad Suleman Hussain.

“The selectors ignored those players who made the country proud at the last Asian Champions Trophy. They should have at least been invited at the camp,” Bajwa told reporters at the National Hockey Stadium on Wednesday.

He further said that 11 players selected for the camp, such as Adnan Shakoor (Gojra), Mohammad Iqbal (Toba Tek Singh), Abdul Sattar (Quetta), Waleed Hameed (Peshawar), Hammad (Karachi), Liaquat Rasool (Vehari), Shah Gee (Police), Shehbaz Ahmad (Vehari), Zeeshan Akram (Police), Ali Hassan (Karachi) and Zahidullah (Peshawar), had no hockey background and they were little known in the hockey circles.

“I can bet none of them will get a place in the national team for the Asian Games as they are included just for a joyride,” said Bajwa, who had faced lot of criticism as PHF secretary from Islahuddin and Shahnaz Sheikh.

“It is the duty of every patriot to speak against the evil, I am therefore here to highlight wrongdoings of the selectors who are bent on destroying hockey in the country,” he said.

When contacted, chief selector Islahuddin said he would not respond to Asif Bajwa’s allegations.

“We are focused on our programme under which we have called 37 probables for the training camp after holding trials across the country,” he said.

“We considered only those players who appeared in the trials instead of considering performance of the team which won the last Asian Champions Trophy,” he said.

Islah added that only Haseem Khan was selected without appearing at the trials only because he went abroad with PHF’s permission to play hockey.