KARACHI Striker Shakeel Abbasi has been named the captain of a new-look 18-member Pakistan squad in the four-nation Hamburg Masters hockey tournament being held in Germany from October 3 to 5.
The team was named on Friday by President Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali after watching the trials with Secretary Asif Bajwa and Chief Coach Jehangir Butt.
Vice captain and full-back Muhammad Imran did not feature in the trials but retained his place in the team.
`Like the whole nation we were highly disappointed with the result at the Beijing Olympics but this is part and parcel of the game,` Zafarullah Jamali said.
Seven players from the Olympic squad participated in the trials. These included goalkeeper Nasir Ahmed, forwards Shakeel Abbasi, Shafqat Rasool, Muhammad Zubair, Waqas Sharif and half-back Rana Asif.
Several senior players including skipper Zeeshan Ashraf, Muhammad Saqlain were not invited to the camp while Rehan Butt and Salman Akbar had already left to play in Dutch League and Waqas Akbar and Abbas Haider joined their French League teams.
Pakistan squad Nasir Ahmed, Imran Shah, (goal-keepers), Muhammad Imran (Vice Captain), Kashif Ali, Muhammad Ateeq (full-backs); Rana Asif, M. Irfan, Fareed Ahmed, Zaheer Ahmed, Aamir Shehzad (half-backs); M.Waqas Sharif, Shafqat Rasool, Shakeel Abbasi (Captain), Akhtar Ali, Abdul Haseem Khan, M. Taufeeq, Inayatullah, Muhammad Zubair (forwards).
Officials Jehangir Butt (Chief coach/Manager), Kamran Ashraf, Danish Kaleem (coaches) Faiz-ur-Rehman (Physio) and Nadeem Lodhi (Video Analyst).
