Tag: Hockey Team coach Siegfried Aikman

Pakistan Hockey team’s coach Siegfried Aikman steps down

LAHORE: The head coach of the Pakistan men’s hockey team Siegfried Aikman on Thursday, has stepped down from his position.

According to the details, the Dutch coach did not receive a salary from the Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) for the past 12 months which made it “impossible for him to continue working” with the team.

“A lot of promises were made but they were not fulfilled. I wanted to fulfil my commitment but it’s time for me to move on,” said Aikman.

As per the sources, the reason behind the delay in Aikman’s salary was a rift between the Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) and PHF.

PHF General Secretary Haider Hussain expressed his disappointment over Aikman’s decision while accepting that nothing was being paid to the head coach.

He also claimed that he contacted the PSB regarding this matter on a number of occasions but the board did not take any action to resolve the issue.

It is worth mentioning here that PHF appointed Siegfried Aikman as Pakistan’s head coach in December 2021 for a five-year-long contract.

The Dutch has previously served as coach of the Japanese team, which stunned the world by winning the Asian Games title in 2018.

‘Players weren’t fully recovered from SA match’ Pakistan hockey coach

BIRMINGHAM: Pakistan’s hockey team head coach Siegfried Aikman put the blame for the team’s defeat against New Zealand in the  Commonwealth Games on the lack of time to fully recover from the previous game. 

Aikman claimed that the team’s attacking strategy against New Zealand backfired as the players did not get ample time to recover from the match against South Africa just a day earlier.

“Our aim was to play very attacking. We saw opportunities after analyzing New Zealand and our match. In our wish to attack we neglected that we played the day before and that we might not have fully recovered.” wrote Aikman in a thread posted on his Twitter account.

The national hockey team has so far remained unimpressive in their Commonwealth campaign as they lost 1-4 against New Zealand following a 2-2 draw against South Africa in their first encounter.

Head coach Aikman further stated that the team lagged in their attack and made too many unforced errors in passing while claiming that it was necessary for the team to be physically stronger in order to play an attacking game against physical fit teams.

“We were unable to score and just before the end they scored the last goal. Conclusion we played an attacking match when possible but to do so against physical fit teams we need to be physically stronger,” he said.

“Players were not fully recovered from the SA match and made to many unforced errors in passing and receiving we also had problems with tactical decision making. We have 2 days to recover and to prepare for the Scotland match.” he added.

Aikman expressed hope that the team would perform well in their next game against Scotland on August 3 and demonstrate what they had learnt so far from the previous matches.

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