Daily Times

Pakistan hockey great Islahuddin Siddiqui has lived an eventful and colourful life for more than five decades now. Siddique, born on 10 January, 1948, is an iconic sports figure of the country. A right winger, Siddique played between 1967 and 1978. He was capped 130 times and scored 117 goals. He won silver medal in the 1972 Olympics and bronze medal in the 1976 Olympics. Undefined Siddique is perhaps the only forward in history to gain more fame for saving goals than scoring goals despite being the world’s best forward of his times. Siddique is considered the fastest man in field hockey, who used to blunt the penalty corner strikes of his strong rivals with his deadly dash that burst from the cage like lightening.

Siddique got hooked up to sports very early, and was adept at many sports, thankfully he chose to focus on hockey on his father’s advice. This multi-talent helped him to become a sharp forward as well as a great dasher (chargers in present day parlance). He was only 19 when he won the national colours in 1967 though he missed out the Mexico Olympics next year, which Pakistan won. His first big tournament was the 1970 Asian Games, after that was firmly ensconced in the national side till 1978. In fact, 1978 was the annus mirabilis of Pakistan hockey, when the green shirts won three major titles under his command: the World Cup, the Asian Games and the inaugural FIH Champions’ Trophy. He remained captain of the Pakistan hockey team in 45 matches: 43 matches were won and two matches ended in a draw. His impressive medal list consists of 10 gold, 03 silver and 01 bronze medals.

After his retirement from the sport, he is still associated with hockey. He served as a coach and manager of the national team many a time and also a member of the FIH rules board. He was called time and again to revive the sinking fortunes of the national team in the managerial role. But as soon as the side showed signs of recovery, he was sidelined. Like all his compatriots, Siddique is very much saddened by Pakistan hockey’s continuous decline. In his autobiography ‘Dash Through My Life’, he elaborates on the causes of this downfall and also suggests short, medium and long term measures to stem the decline and regain the glory. Many fear that it’s game over for Pakistan hockey. But Siddique doesn’t agree. “Pessimism won’t help Pakistan hockey. We can talk about hockey being finished and that all hope is lost but that would lead us to nowhere,” he says. He is of the view that all of Pakistan’s stake-holders should stop wasting time on crying over spilt milk. “A lot is being said about how pitiful is the state of our hockey and with due reason. But, personally I believe that instead of emphasising on that we should instead of asking questions as to how we can put our hockey back on track,” he says. He believes that Pakistan’s hockey chiefs will have to think long-term. “Hockey will never die in Pakistan because it has strong roots in our country. It has gone down because of our own mistakes. It can rise again but for that we will need to work hard. It is a sum total of our collective mistakes during the last three decades that we are lagging behind teams against whom we would win at will in the past.”. The FIH awarded him ‘Diploma of Merit’, in recognition of his outstanding international hockey services. The Pakistan Government awarded him ‘Pride of Performance’ in 1982 and ‘Sitara-e-Imtiaz’ for his services for Pakistan hockey in the year 2007.

Published in Daily Times, July 30^th , 2017.