Reasons behind India's recent success in World Hockey

Mostar95 · March 15, 2017, 10:26pm

Re: Reasons behind India’s recent success in World Hockey

In the 80s Pakistan had dream forwards

Players who played together:

left out Samiullah (‘flying horse’)
left in: Hanif Khan (very quick on his feet)

centre forward: Hassan Sardar (magician)

right in: Manzoor Jr. (master dribbler) &
right out: Kalimullah (Samiullah’s brother)

But if I was picking an all-time Pak forward line-up then I would replace Hanif with Shahbaz Ahmed Sr. (1994 World Cup winning captain) and find a way to include Shahnaz Sheikh as well (? in place of Kalimullah)

Despite Shahbaz’s opening goal, Pakistan lost the final against Holland 1-3 in Lahore but then beat the same opponents 5-4 on penalties (1-1 in normal time) in Sydney in 1994

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUb9hKpKUkk

Shahbazy

And ofcourse Sohail Abbas (penalty corner specialist and record goal scorer in hockey with 348 goals) will be one of the full-backs

If Sohail and Shahbaz were with the teams of the late 70s and early 80s or that team was in their era - could you imagine what records Pakistan would have set in World Hockey!!!

I was in the stadium to watch this match alas Pakistan lost eventually! That was the record of crowd to watch a hockey world cup final. I met late Christopher More of Daily Telegraph then who gave me a his book “Autumn Gold”!