PESHAWAR
Newly posted Director General Sports Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Captain (Retd) Khalid Mehmood has said that his top most priority is to facilitate the young talented players who are lacking basic facilities like proper playing kits, shoes, proper equipment and level playing fields.
Talking exclusively to APP, newly appointed Captain (Retd) Khalid Mehmood, who assured his charge as Director General Sports Khyber Pakhtunkhwa before performing his duties at DG Galiyat Development Authority (GDA), Deputy Commissioner Peshawar and Political Agent Peshawar.
Being a player himself and going to participate as a player in the 34th National Games’s Pistol and Rifles Skeet Competitions in Jhelum, Captain (Retd) Khalid Mehmood said that no one would be allowed to eat up funds allocated for the talented players. Such funds, he said, would be utilized properly for nurturing upcoming talent.
He said it is astonishing to see that our young talented players do not have proper kits, shoes, equipment level playing field which should be ensured as his priority number one. He said there are dozens of coaches in the Directorate General Sports so it would be made that these coaches would be proper track-suites and would be there coaching young talent in their respective Games rather than time passing.
He said it should be ensured that every coach should be present to coach their respective players so that good talent could be brought to the national and international level. He said Games like squash, hockey, volleyball, football, table tennis, tennis, martial arts games etc have good talent in the province including merged tribal areas but lack of proper planning and proper facilities such talent could not come up at national and international levels.
He was presented with a souvenir by Deputy Chef de Mission of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa contingent Ilyas Afridi congratulated by the Director of Development and Focal Person for the National Games Salim Raza was also present in his office.
Newly appointed DG Sports Khalid Mahmood said that the best facilities including food, kits, sports equipment would also be provided to the youth of merged areas. He said that the coaches would have to work hard with the players on the ground in track-suits and will also bring changes with the aim of providing facilities to the players. In response to a question, he said that the players would be provided maximum opportunities to go ahead for which all resources will be utilized.
He also called a meeting on Thursday with the office-bearers of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Olympic Association to discuss the safety of the players going to represent the province in the 34th National Games. He said so far the teams including Football, Handball, Hockey, Boxing have been stopped because of the blocking of roads because safety is our top most priority.
DG Sports Captain (retd) Khalid Mahmood said a total of 81 players including 15 members boxing, 18 members male football team, 29 members male and female teams of Handball and 19 members team of hockey with officials were scheduled to leave for Quetta in the evening but due to present situation it was decided to stop them till finalizing ways and means related to their safety.
