Reacting strongly to Hockey India president Narender Batra’s demand for an unconditional apology from Pakistan players for their boorish behaviour during last year’s Champions Trophy, former coach Shahnaz Sheikh termed it as an excuse to deny their players from playing in the HIL.
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Two players were handed a one-game ban and reprimanded by the international Hockey Federation (FIH) after the Pakistan team went on a rampage post their semi-final win against India in Bhubaneswar in December last year.
Following the final hooter, excited Pakistani players took off their shirts and made rude gestures towards the Indian fans and the media at the packed 7,000-capacity Kalinga Stadium.
Batra said no Pakistani player will be called for Indian Hockey League.
“Shahnaz Sheikh has apologised and assured me that such behaviour will not occur again”, said a press statement by Wiert Doyer, tournament director of the Champions Trophy. HIL is committed to promoting the world’s best hockey and with this new rules, players will improve themselves in a competitive environment. India is just making excuses to keep Pakistani players away from its league, he said.
Nine Pakistani players were part of the first edition of Hockey India League (HIL) in 2013 but had to leave the country before the start of the tournament following protests from a few political organisations.
“Matters seemed to have been resolved after Sheikh’s apology, even though the FIH had hinted of possible action against the Pakistani team.”
“Having said that we should not be short-sighted in our approach and segregate the coaches as foreign and India”.
Speaking about the internal hockey affairs, he said the Inter Provincial Coordination Ministry (IPC) and Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) should grant the deserved prize money to the players for performances in Champions Trophy and Asian Games.
“We expressed our regrets and the PHF officials present there pulled up our players as well even though they had reacted to the boorish behaviour of a section of the crowd which kept on abusing them”, he made a counter-allegations.
The Hockey Asia leader also revealed options of getting qualified coaches for planning and coaching of the activity and people in the united states.
“We have never had any egos as far as hiring foreign professionals are concerned”.
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The six franchisee will bid for players from India, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, USA, England, South Africa, Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, Scotland, Malaysia, Japan and Korea to complete their teams. “So we are in the process of equipping our players with the best support staff for a bright future of the national game”, Batra said.
