ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Tennis Federation (PTF) on Wednesday finalized the five-member team for next month’s Davis Cup tie against Uzbekistan with Shahzad Khan and Heera Ashiq completing the squad.

The pair join a Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi, Aqeel Khan and Muzammil Murtaza.

The PTF recently held trials to select two players for the remaining slots for the fixture at the Pakistan Sports Complex’s gross court on April 6 and 7.

Shahzad and Heera narrowly edged out Mohammad Abid Mushtaq on a head-to-head win count, as all three had same number of wins.

In the last match, Shahzad beat Heera 6-1, 6-2.

Earlier, Heera had beaten Abid 7-6, 6-3, and Abid defeated Shahzad Khan 6-7, 7-5, 6-3.

According to the PTF, the trials were held on the grass courts of the Aisam-ul-Haq Tennis Complex in the Sports Complex here.

A PTF statement said that PTF president Salim Saifullah Khan was keen to have three top juniors also attend the trials for the sake of exposure and experience gained from playing with top players but the plan couldn’t be materialized due the top junior player Shoaib Khan playing the Junior Davis Cup event in Colombo while two other juniors were participating in the inter-provincial games in Peshawar.

With Aqeel and Muzammil already in Islamabad, all players will be travelling to Lahore to play in the Shaharyar Malik National Grass Courts Championships, from March 25 to 31, being organized by the Punjab Lawn Tennis Association.

The Davis Cup squad members will also be holding practice and training sessions during the course of the tournament. . The timely tournament in Lahore will allow the players the continuity of playing on grass which should be of considerable benefit for all.

Aisam is expected to join the team by end of the month or early April upon arrival from overseas.

Published in Dawn, March 22nd, 2018