The past two months have been particularly tough on Pakistan sports. First, the men’s cricket team’s questionable preparation for the T20 World Cup, which featured a drawn home series against a depleted New Zealand squad, a loss away to Ireland, and a whitewash away to England. Then the debacle in the World Cup, succumbing to a team playing their only World Cup courtesy of being the hosts, before a collapse of astronomical proportions, even by Pakistan standards, against India.

The women’s cricket team did not fare much better, losing all three ODIs and four out of five T20s against West Indies at home. On the tour to England, which coincided with the men’s tour to the same country, they failed to win a single match.

Expectations were not high for the men’s football team, having already outdone themselves by qualifying for the second round of the FIFA World Cup Qualifiers for the first time in our history. Losses were expected against much higher-ranked oppositions in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Tajikistan.

But the drama surrounding the installation of floodlights in Jinnah Stadium in Islamabad for the final home game against Saudi Arabia and the Pakistan Football Federation’s inability to arrange adequate transportation for the squad to travel to Dushanbe for the final match against Tajikistan, left a lot of question marks.

Quietly and unsung, Pakistan volleyball is doing far better than all other sports in the country. And it has a promising future to look forward to

Add to this the fact that the men’s hockey team lost the decider in the qualification tournament for the 2024 Olympics — against New Zealand in January — to make it the third Games in a row that will be without the Green Shirts, and it makes for pretty grim reading.

In the midst of all this, there is one sport wherein our team has been quietly doing very well.

Pakistan’s volleyball........

© Dawn (Magazines)