Hockey 'shoots itself in the foot'
Former national skipper Farooq Saeed is scathing of officials over failure to qualify for the Asian Games
Former men's hockey captain Farooq Saeed has hit out at Hong Kong's failure to qualify for the Asian Games for the first time in two decades saying the Hong Kong Hockey Association's excuse that stringent player-eligibility rules led to the poor show in the qualifiers in Bangladesh did not stand up to scrutiny.
With the Asian Games governing body, the Olympic Council of Asia, following IOC guidelines of passport-only as a measure for an athlete's eligibility for the first time, Hong Kong was forced to send a side described as "second string" by Sarinder Dillon, the president of the Hong Kong Hockey Association.
They lost all their matches in the eight-team qualifying competition where six berths were available for the Incheon Games in September.
Once the bulk of us retired, there was no one left who could step into our shoes and four years on, the results are plain to see
The men's team had played in every Asian Games since the qualifying process was put in place for the first time for the 1998 Bangkok Games.
"All we needed was to win one game to qualify, but we couldn't even beat Iran, who only started playing hockey in recent years. It hurts badly to see Hong Kong missing out on these Games," said Saeed.
A solid central defender, Saeed, 44, represented Hong Kong for 20 years and played in four Asian Games starting with the 1990 edition in Beijing, 1998, 2002 and 2006.
He retired from international hockey in 2009, but came back to represent Hong Kong at cricket at the last Asian Games in Guangzhou four years ago.