KARACHI: Talented fourteen years old Shiraz Asif, a promising baseball player, aspires to become a professional in the game in the years ahead.

An O-Level student of Army Public School, he represented the Pakistan Junior baseball team as vice-captain in the 8th Asian Junior Baseball Championship held in Shizuoka, Japan last week.

“We could not win any position in the tournament and yet our performance was greatly appreciated by the event officials,” said Shiraz.

The youngster, who had also represented Pakistan in the under-12 Baseball World Cup in Taiwan in 2013, said his mission is to represent Pakistan’s senior team in times ahead and then become a professional player of the game.

He was of the view that adequate facilities for baseball should be made available for the youngsters in the country so that they could come up with distinctions in this game. “Opportunities for training abroad should also be provided,” he said.

Shiraz also mentioned the hard work put in by team leader Syed Fakhar Ali Shah and head coach Musaddaq Hanif during the event.

In appreciation of his performance, Karachi Commissioner Shoaib Siddiqui decorated Shiraz with a special medal. “This is great encouragement for me to excel in the game for my country,” he said.

Published in Dawn, October 22nd, 2015

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