ATHENS, Feb 24: The Greek Hockey Federation (GHF) said on Tuesday it had taken the International Hockey Federation (FIH) to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) for the failure of its men's team to automatically qualify for the Athens Olympics.

"We took the case to the Court of Arbitration on Feb 17," GHF head Yiorgos Tsogas told Reuters.

Tsogas said the Greek men's hockey team should have automatically qualified for the Olympics, since Cuba, who they had been scheduled to play against in a qualifying match, pulled out citing economic difficulties.

"According to international sports law, when a rival team withdraws, the other team automatically qualifies", Tsogas said.

He said the FIH arbitrarily changed qualification criteria and forced the Greek team, which ranked 50th in the world in 2002, to compete with Canada in a game they lost ruling them out of the August 13 to 29 Games. Tsogas said CAS was due to rule on the case in a month. -Reuters