A bad day for Pakistan hockey: Captain

Disappointment all round after thrashing against Australia.

KARACHI:

In the aftermath of Pakistan’s dismal show in the Champions Trophy in New Zealand, the country’s hockey federation chief selector Hanif Khan placed blame on the coach Michel van den Heuvel and the team management.

Pakistan lost all three group matches and are out of contention for a last-four spot. Khan said the Greenshirts needed to rethink their strategy and the Dutch coach needed to step up to the challenge.

“Heuvel will have to step up and rethink his strategy since the team failed miserably,” Khan told The Express Tribune. “I can’t blame the players. They did what they thought was right. The midfielders were not effective and the forwards failed to score despite 10 attempts on goal and that shows that they are not getting the appropriate guidance.”

Team manager Khwaja Junaid admitted that his side played poorly against the world champions, a 6-1 loss that sealed its fate in the event.

“It was a major disappointment to see the team lose by that big a margin and I wasn’t looking forward to that kind of a performance from my team which beat the same side in the final of a tri-nation series last month,” Junaid told APP before admitting that it was a bitter reality that the team could not achieve its set goals in the first round of the tournament.

Meanwhile, captain Mohammad Imran, who took over the reigns from stand-in skipper Shakeel Abbasi for the event simply put the loss as ‘a bad day for Pakistan hockey.”

Published in The Express Tribune, December 8^th, 2011.