KARACHI: The fact that former Asian giants Pakistan and India are still far from their biggest goal - to join the top teams of the hockey world - has been underlined again after the neighbors failed to find any place in the list of nominations for 2009’s Player of the Year awards.
The International Hockey Federation (FIH) on Wednesday announced the lists for the 2009 Men’s Player of the Year and the Young Player of the Year awards.
There was no Pakistani or Indian player in either of the two lists, which are dominated by players from Europe and Australia. In fact, Korea is the only Asian nation to have contributed to the list.
For Pakistan and India, it is another reminder that they need to achieve a lot of improvement before being able to join the ranks of the top teams - Australia, Germany, Netherlands and Spain.
In the past, Pakistani players like Sohail Abbas, Waseem Ahmed and Shakeel Abbasi were nominated for the FIH awards but neither of them ever managed to win it.
Sohail, who holds the record of scoring the highest number of goals in international hockey, came close when he was regarded as the favorite to win the Player of the Year Award in 2004 when the ceremony took place in Lahore on the sidelines of the Champions Trophy.
However, he was ignored in spite of the fact that Sohail was by far the highest scorer of the year. The 2004 award went to Jamie Dwyer, the talismanic Australian striker.
Dwyer has been nominated again for the 2009 honors along with experienced Spaniard Pol Amat, Barry Middleton of England, wily Dutch striker Teun de Nooijer, Korea’s Jong Ho Seo and Christopher Zeller of Germany.
The nominations for the Young Player of the Year award are: Simon Child (NZL), Sergi Enrique (ESP), Tobias Hauke (GER), Ashley Jackson (ENG), Robert Kemperman (NED) and Eddie Ockenden (AUS).
All players participating at the Champions Trophy had their chance to vote and out of the votes received, the FIH established a short list. The winners of the awards will come out of this selection.
The winners will be announced during the final weekend of the Champions Trophy that is currently under progress in Melbourne.
Pakistan, record four-time world champions, are not featuring in the elite six-nation tournament as they failed to qualify for it. India, too,
are missing from the tournament.
However, both Pakistan and India will take a shot at making the cut for the 2010 Champions Trophy as they will be featuring in the eight-nation Champions Challenge that gets underway in Salta (Argentina) from Dec. 6. The team winning the tournament will qualify for next year’s Champions Trophy.
