LAHORE: The cash-strapped Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) which had gone from pillar to post to generate funds for its national and junior teams early this year also approached the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to come forward and bail out the hockey federation but the request went in vain.

Well-informed sources told Dawn that PHF president Akhtar Rasool had written a letter to PCB chairman Shaharyar M. Khan in the month of May, appealing him to provide Rs50 million to the PHF, either as loan or a grant, so that it could field the national team in the Olympics qualifying round. However, the PCB did not give any response to the PHF appeals.

Moreover, the PHF also wanted to send its junior team to Holland for a six-nation tournament starting there on July 18. The tournament is the only available opportunity for the PHF to prepare its junior team for the qualifying round of the Junior World Cup, to be held in India this year. But sources said the PCB did not even bother to give any reply to that request as well.

However, the Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) later came forward to provide a generous grant to the PHF which prety much solved their problems and it managed to send its senior team to Belgium. It is another story that the national team failed to qualify for the Rio Olympics and the nation had to bear the ignominy of getting ousted from the extravaganza for the first ever time in its history.

Currently two fact finding committees are working both at government and PHF level to find out reasons for the debacle. The PHF, due to paucity of funds, has also decided not to send its Junior team to Holland.

It may be mentioned here that during the PCB tenure of retired Lt Gen Tauqir Zia, the Board had helped out the PHF on the request of then federation president retired Lt Gen Mohammad Aziz Khan and had granted a loan of Rs20 million. Both Tauqir and Aziz were then serving generals in the early 2000.

Published in Dawn, July 16th, 2015

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