ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan squad along with officials left for United Kingdom on Sunday to participate in the British Junior Open Squash Champi­onship, which runs from Jan 2 to 6.

The Pakistan Squash Federation (PSF) secretary Tahir Sultan told Dawn said that PSF is pinning high hopes on junior players, who had trained rigorously for three months for the event.

“We have some very good junior players who have potential to brining laurels for country,” he said, while adding that in the last edition Noor Zaman reached the under-15 semi-finals.

Hamza Sharif, Haris Qasim and Uzair Shaukat would participate in the under-19 event while Noor Zaman, Asadullah, Ashab Arfan and Walid Khalil will be seen in action in the under-17 competition.

Hamza Khan and Anas Ali Bukhari will vie in the under-15 event, while the duo of Abdullah Nawaz and Sakhi Tareen will participate in the under-13 event.

Asif Khan and retired Air Cmdr Aftab Qureshi and Hussain Odhwani are accompanying the squad as head coach and team manager, respectively.

A total of 12 Pakistani players were due to participate in the coming events but three of them — Sakhi Tareen, Uzair Shaukat Ashab Irfan — have yet to get visas “We are hopeful these three players will receive their passport most likely by Monday,” Tahir concluded.

Published in Dawn, December 30th, 2019