It’s still more than a year to go before the 2012 Olympics get underway, but Pakistan have decided to begin preparing for the assignment at full throttle with their Dutch coach Michel van den Heuvel supervising the camp that will include the country’s top players.

However, the Pakistan Hockey federation (PHF) has snubbed Zeeshan Ashraf, the seasoned defender who led the Greenshirts to their first Asian Games title in 20 years in the Chinese city of Guangzhou last year.

Ashraf, who opted out of this month’s Sultan Azlan Shah Cup in Ipoh (Malaysia), is not included in the list of players in the preliminary squad that was pick for the tour of Europe on Friday.

His omission from the camp probables makes it clear that the PHF has decided to sideline the aging defender as it prepares Pakistan’s team for the 2012 Olympic Games.

Several other senior players including short corner specialist Sohail Abbas were luckier. Sohail along with other senior players like Rehan Butt, Waseem Ahmed and Shakeel Abbasi were invited to the training camp by the PHF.

The camp will begin just weeks before a strenuous tour of Europe where Pakistan will feature in back-to-back quadrangular tournaments in Dublin (Ireland) and Amsterdam (Netherlands) before playing a series of test matches against European teams.

Pakistan are looking towards next summer’s Olympic Games in London in a buoyant mood following a couple of positive results on the international circuit in the last six months.

The Greenshirts followed their title-winning triumph at the Asian Games in China late last year with an appearance in the final of the 2011 Sultan Azlan Shah Cup last Sunday where they lost to reigning world champions Australia 2-3 in extra-time.

It is a stunning turnaround for the Pakistanis, who suffered the ignominy of finishing last in the 2010 World Cup in New Delhi last year. At the same venue, they also flopped miserably in the Commonwealth Games last year.

But things are getting better and better for the Pakistanis, who are now hoping to make their presence felt in the 2012 London Games.

“Everything is falling in place as we prepare ourselves for the Olympic Games,” said Pakistan’s new captain Muhammad Imran.

“We are making the right progress for the Olympic Games which is our main target now,” he added.

Shahid Ali Khan, Pakistan’s assistant coach, is confident that by playing around 50 international matches over the next 12 months his team will get ready for the Olympics.

“We will play many international matches in Europe, China, Australia and India before going to London and I’m sure that the team will go to London fully prepared,” Shahid told Arab News.