Umpire Selim Lucky was the only person among the six show-caused hockey players and officials who submitted his reasons for the national team’s debacle in the recently concluded Asia Cup. Lucky submitted his reply to the Bangladesh Hockey Federation (BHF) governing body yesterday.
Earlier, BHF served show-cause notices to four senior players - Russell Mahmud Jimmy, Zahid Hossain, Qumruzzaman Rana, Imran Hasan Pintu along with coach Mahbub Harun and umpire Lucky on October 13 and gave 10 days to answer with the reasons behind the Asia Cup failure. Nine days have already gone by and national forward Jimmy said yesterday that he will submit his reply today, the last day of submission.
When tried to reach coach Harun over phone he didn’t answer the calls, while Rana, who was at his home district Jhinaidah, said yesterday, “I received the show-cause letter on Monday and couldn’t answer it yet.”
BHF general secretary Khawaja Rahmatullah confirmed that nobody had replied to the show-causes except Selim Lucky. Khawaja said the executive committee will take the necessary steps if the accused players don’t reply on time. However, the federation officials don’t want to disclose the punishment the players might face for their actions during the Asia Cup.
The decision to serve show-cause notices was made in an executive committee meeting on October 10 following the reports submitted by coach Naveed Alam, manager Abdur Rashid Sikdar and the three-member fact-finding committee. Bangladesh’s Pakistani head coach Naveed, skipper Mamunur Rahman Chayan, Krishna Kumar, Pushkar Khisha Mimo and Mainul Islam Kaushik were also warned by the hockey federation for their roles during the tournament.
