KARACHI, 24 February 2004 — Pakistan field hockey captain Mohammed Nadeem is confident his side can book their place at this summer’s Athens Olympics with victory in next week’s qualifying tournament in Madrid.
Pakistan, three-time Olympic gold medalists and four-time world champions, have slumped desperately over the past three years and have failed to win a major title anywhere.
They finished their worst ever fourth in the 2002 Asian Games in Busan, South Korea and also failed to win the Asia Cup last year.
But Nadeem believes Pakistan’s runners-up finish in the prestigious Sultan Azlan Shah tournament in Malaysia last month bodes well for the March 2-13 Olympic qualifying campaign. “We are well prepared and with our runners-up finish at the Azlan Shah hockey event last month I feel we are on track for winning the Olympic qualifying event,” Nadeem said as Pakistan left here yesterday.
The top six teams at Madrid will earn a berth for the Olympics in August. The 12th team at the Olympics will either be the seventh qualifier, or Greece who have appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) to get an Olympic berth as hosts. Five teams have already qualified for the Athens Olympics on account of winning the continental championships with South Korea as Asian champions, Australia as Oceania champions, Argentina (Americas), Germany (Europe) and Egypt (Africa).
Pakistan is pitted alongside arch-rival India, Malaysia, New Zealand, Belgium and Canada while reigning Olympic champions the Netherlands, Great Britain, Spain, Japan, South Africa and Poland are in the other group. Mohammad Sarwar and Adnan Maqsood would travel to Spain later.
Pakistan team: Muhammad Nadeem (captain), Ahmed Alam, Salman Akbar, Ali Raza, Sohail Abbas, Zeeshan Ashraf, Ghazanfar Ali, Muhammad Saqlain, Dilawar Husain, Wasim Ahmed, Adnan Maqsood, Rehan Butt, Mudassar Ali Khan, Kashif Jawwad, Shabbir Husain, Shakil Abbasi, Muhammad Sarwar, Salim Khalid.
