Pakistan squash suffers big blow

Players unable to participate in CW Games due to POA conflict.

KARACHI: Pakistan’s squash players are gutted that they will miss out on participation at the Commonwealth Games as they feel they had chances of winning medals at the event to be held in Glasgow, Scotland.

The country’s sports have been suffering due to infighting between the two parallel Pakistan Olympic Association (POA) leaderships, while Pakistan continues to miss out at major international events.

Pakistan missed out on the Islamic Solidarity Games last time around in a similar tussle, as both associations wanted to send accreditations through their own affiliation.



This time around as well, the two POAs continue to quarrel with each other in order to prove their legitimacy over the other, and resultantly no Pakistani squash players will participate in the Commonwealth Games for the first time since squash was inducted in the event.

“It’s a pity that Pakistani players will not be able to participate in the Commonwealth Games,” one of the national players told The Express Tribune.

“We’d been training very hard for all the major upcoming events, and the competitions in Glasgow were on our agenda too. However, once again the athletes have suffered due to the power struggle in parallel Olympic associations of Pakistan.”

Another player added that the athletes should not be dragged into such controversies. In his view, the players should be allowed to participate in important international events by putting aside differences and such matters should be dealt with amicably by the officials.

“The players don’t care about these power struggles between authorities and they should allow athletes to represent their country at big international events,” he said. “They have ruined a perfect opportunity for us to achieve medals for Pakistan.”

Published in The Express Tribune, July 22^nd, 2014.

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