Chinese hockey team to visit Pakistan next month

LAHORE: A hockey team from China’s Gansu province will visit Pakistan on a two months long preparatory tour in the last week of November.

“The tour has been arranged by the Chinese Hockey Association and Gansu Government to impart top hockey training to the team,” said former Olympian Naveed Alam, who is the coach of the Gansu team and nowadays in Lahore on a short break. He told this agency on Wednesday that the aim of the tour was to prepare the team for National Games of China being held next year.

Naveed took over as the coach of the Chinese team to lift its performance and he has gained some positive results in a few months time. His team now stands at number three position compared to its previous ranking of 6th when he was assigned the task.

He said the team would be playing practice matches against the participating teams of the Champions Trophy hockey tournament and it would give them high profile experience and exposure. “Apart from getting this useful experience the Chinese team will also be playing matches in other cities against departmental and services teams,” said the celebrated full-back who represented the country in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics and 1994 and 1998 World Cups held in Australia and Holland. He said the Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) had assured its full cooperation for the tour as far safety and security of the visiting team was concerned.

He said the Chinese Hockey Association wanted to build a strong team for the 2008 Olympics and it had hired the services of a number of foreign coaches to groom their provincial teams to eventually form a national team for the Olympics. app

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