ISLAMABAD, Dec 4: Players staying away from the training camps for the 9th SAF Games will face bans of upto two years, officials warned on Thursday.

“The decision has been taken to prevent players from absenting themselves from the camps,” Brig Arif Mahmood Siddiqui, the head of Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) told journalists after chairing a high-level meeting.

Attended by secretaries of national federations, the meeting discussed preparations and worked out modalities for the SAF Games which Islamabad is due to host between March 29 and April 7.

The federations were directed to finalise their teams by Feb 20 while a cut-off date for giving final touches to the venues was set for March 15.

“Programme of all disciplines has been finalised with each federation being allowed one foreign training tour ahead of the Games,” Arif said. However the athletics federation is said to be not keen on sending their athletes abroad.

The SAF Games, postponed three times since October 2001, will feature athletics, badminton, boxing, football, kabaddi, rifle shooting, rowing, squash, swimming, table tennis, taekwondo, volleyball, weightlifting, wrestling and karate.

Eleven out of 15 camps are currently on and Arif termed their training regimen satisfactory. “Some of the foreign coaches we have hired are already here to train different teams while others will be arriving shortly.”

The meeting also decided that players would not be granted leave in the run-up to the Games so that there is continuity in preparations.

Meanwhile, Latif Butt secretary of the Pakistan Olympic Association (POA) who was also in the meeting, dismissed the impression that there was no harmony between his association, the sports ministry, the SAF Games organisers and the federations.

“We are unanimous as far as promotion of sports in concerned and have worked like a family.... there has no disagreement because we have a common cause.”