KARACHI, Aug 21 Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) President Qasim Zia and Secretary Asif Bajwa met with Karachi Electric Supply Corporation (KESC) CEO Naved Ismail and KESC Manager Sports Farooq Khan at the KESC head office in Saddar here on Friday.

According to sources within KESC and the PHF, besides discussing matters concerning the forthcoming PHF National Junior Under-18 Hockey League to be held at the Hockey Club of Pakistan (HCP) in Karachi from Sept 1 to 18, the PHF top brass is also looking for appropriate sponsorship for the junior hockey team.

“The PHF is looking for sponsors to build the sport from the grassroots level and KESC too is happy to extend a helping hand like we are doing already in football and boxing,” said KESC Manager Sports Farooq Khan when contacted by Dawn on Friday evening.

“Our CEO has asked Qasim Zia and Bajwa sahib to supply us with a proposal so that we can review the possibilities,” he added.

Meanwhile, Asif Bajwa said “Well, we had an informal meeting where we discussed matters related to next month's junior league. It is a floodlit tournament about which we had our reservations regarding power failures. So we wanted to talk about that, too.”

The PHF have already announced prizes worth Rs2 million for the league with Rs700,000 for the winner, Rs500,000 for the runners-up and Rs300,000 for the third position holder. There will also be individual prizes for best player (Rs100,000), best goalkeeper and highest scorer (Rs50,000 each) along with a prize of Rs5,000 for the man of each match.

About the sponsorship matter, Bajwa said “Of course we want the KESC and the other departments, too, to patronize hockey. The Pakistan Olympic Association President Arif Hasan in his recent statement has named hockey as Pakistan's only hope to bring a medal in the Olympics and we agree with him wholeheartedly which is why we are changing the entire format of hockey here from the grassroots level. We are always happy to see others taking an interest in our efforts to build the sport here.”

The meeting was also attended by PHF Director Administration Olympian Iftikhar Syed and Finance Secretary Gulfraz Ahmed.