ISLAMABAD: National hockey team’s poor show in the Hockey World League Semi-finals reverberated in the Senate on Tuesday with Federal Minister for Inter-Provincial Coordination (IPC) Riaz Hussain Prizada saying hockey stakeholders were summoned for Thursday to know the reasons behind the debacle.

Bemoaning the poor show put up by the greenshirts in the HWL, Chairman Senate Main Raza Rabbani said the recent poor show was a shame. “We have hit rock bottom in hockey which is a matter of shame and pity,” he remarked.

Endorsing the view point of the chairman Senate, Leader of the House Raja Zafar-ul-Haq said the entire nation was disappointed after the team’s failure.

“Hockey is our national game and the minister should focus on the work in connection with its uplift,” said the Leader of the House, adding that without providing facilities to players we should not expect favourable results from the team.

Shedding light on reasons behind the poor performance of the national team, the IPC minister said that there was a need for scientific approach for uplifting the game of hockey.

He said rules of hockey and others games wherein Pakistan had tremendous record had completely changed and it was time various federations take steps for implementation of scientific approach in all sports.

He further said that the captain and coach would appear before a six-member probe committee formed on the orders of the prime minister. It is imperative to note that the IPC secretary is the head of the probe body which will question captain Moham­mad Imran, head coach Shahnaz Sheikh and others.

The IPC minister maintained during his Senate speech that the captain and head coach were summoned but when Dawn contacted coach Shahnaz, he said that PHF president and secretary will also appear before the head of the probe committee on Thursday.

The debate on hockey in the Upper House took place in response to a question asked by Senator Rubina Irfan about an attack on the PFF House in Lahore.

However, the IPC minister told the House that his ministry had no role in election issues of the Pakistan Football Federation (PFF).

But he did tell the Upper House that Faisal Saleh Hayat had been occupying the top slot at the PFF for the last 12 years despite a two-term restriction.

Published in Dawn, July 8th, 2015

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