The second Mari Petroleum Azadi Cup Hockey Tournament 2023 is being played at Lt. Gen. Ashfaq Nadeem Hockey Stadium, Rawalpindi, organized by Mari Petroleum Company Limited under the management of Pakistan Hockey Federation.
Two matches were played today on the fourth day of the tournament. The first match was played between Pakistan Navy and Police while the second match was played between hosts Mari Petroleum and Pakistan Army White. In the first match played today, Pakistan Navy defeated the Police team by a clear margin of 9 goals to 1 goal in a one-sided match. On behalf of Pakistan Navy, Basharat scored 3 goals while Rana Waleed, Mohammad Saber, Mohammad Wasim, Zulqarnain, Akbar Ali, Isa Khan, Hamad Ali scored one goal each. Abuzar scored the only goal on behalf of the police. In the match played between Pakistan Navy and Police, Irfan Sabir and Zahid Ali performed the umpiring duties along with Fahad Ali Khan as the reserve umpire. Technical Officer Akhtar Ali along with Hamza Tufail and Yasir Lodhi acted as judges.
Today’s second match was played between Pakistan Army White and Mari Petroleum, the team of Pakistan Army White failed to give a valuable performance in front of the strong and experienced team of Mari Petroleum and did not score a single goal against 12 goals. Arbaaz scored 4 goals, Umair Sattar 3 goals, Wasim Akram 2 goals, Arshad Liaquat 2 goals and Ali Raza scored 1 goal for Skimari Petroleum. Yasir Khursheed International and Malik Safdar performed the umpiring duties in this match along with Rizwan Khan who was the reserve umpire. Yasir Lodhi, Gulfam Khokhar and Asif Shahzad were the judges along with Technical Officer Tahir Sharif.
On this occasion, Tournament Director Olympian Nasir Ali, Olympian Shahnaz Sheikh, Tournament Organizing Secretary Colonel Muhammad Yameen, Assistant Tournament Director Major Tariq Wark, Assistant Tournament Director Raja Shuja Iqbal, Empires Manager Zulfikar Hussain, Assistant Empires Manager Kamran Shah, Assistant Empires Manager Mubarak Ali. Event Media Coordinator Zulfikar Baig, Assistant Media Coordinator Mohammad Hafeez, Haji Naeem and their team along with hockey fans were also present in the stadium.
The semi-final matches of the tournament will be played tomorrow. In Pool A, WAPDA’s team is on top and Army Colors’ team is second, while in Pool B, Mari Petroleum is at the top position in its pool, while Navy is second. In the first semi-final. Pakistan WAPDA will face Pakistan Navy while the second semi-final will be played between Mari Petroleum and Pakistan Army Colors.
