Shahnaz Sheikh (born 21 March 1949) is a retired Pakistani

field hockey Field hockey is a team sport structured in standard hockey format, in which each team plays with ten outfield players and a goalkeeper. Teams must drive a round hockey ball by hitting it with a hockey stick towards the rival team's shooting ...

player Player may refer to: Role or adjective * Player (game), a participant in a game or sport ** Gamer, a player in video and tabletop games ** Athlete, a player in sports ** Player character, a character in a video game or role playing game who ...

. He was born at

Sialkot Sialkot ( ur, ) is a city located in Punjab, Pakistan. It is the capital of Sialkot District and the 13th most populous city in Pakistan. The boundaries of Sialkot are joined with Jammu (the winter capital of Indian administered Jammu and Ka ...

, Pakistan. He is related to Olympians

Zahid Sheikh Muhammad Zahid Sheikh (December 14, 1949 – January 29, 2010) was a field hockey player who played for the Pakistan National Hockey Team from 1969 to 1976. He was born at Sialkot. He was capped 34 times and scored 8 goals. He is the Uncle (Cha ...

and Tariq Sheikh. In 2014, he was the head coach of Pakistan National Hockey Team. A forward, Shahnaz Sheikh played between 1969 and 1978. He was capped 68 times and scored 45 goals for the Pakistan National Hockey Team. He won Silver in 1972 and Bronze in 1976 Olympics . Shahnaz won the 1971 Field

Hockey World Cup The Men's FIH Hockey World Cup is an international field hockey competition organised by the International Hockey Federation (FIH). The tournament was started in 1971. It is held every four years, bridging the four years between the Summer O ...

and was runner-up in 1975 and won again in 1978. Shahnaz was one of the most skilled hockey players that Pakistan had produced. At the same time, Shahnaz was also an explosive player who stood tall among his contemporaries and would have easily walked into any field hockey side in the world. Having been given a feminine name, that was the only soft thing about him as he was a marauder on the left wing, and played an 'inner' to Samiullah Khan during the later part of his career. He ran shivers down the spines of opposition defences with his tremendous ball control and situational awareness. To opposing teams, he was a nemesis, virtually unstoppable on his day and more than a handful on several other occasions. In the early 1970s, he was the most acrobatic Pakistani forward and by the mid-1970s, he had become such a force that his absence from the field through injury was a major cause of the 'Green Shirts' narrowly losing two high-profile matches: the 1975

final against India at

Kuala Lumpur , anthem = ''Maju dan Sejahtera'' , image_map = , map_caption = , pushpin_map = Malaysia#Southeast Asia#Asia , pushpin_map_caption = , coordinates = , sub ...

and the 1976 Montreal Olympics against Australia in the Semis. On both occasions, Pakistan went down 2–1 in controversial circumstances. Shahnaz also had a 'good hockey head' over his shoulders. One lasting impression of him was his rather brief stint as coach of the Pakistan Junior Team, in which Pakistan won the Junior Asia Cup. In 2015, Shahnaz Sheikh served as national team coach but stepped down from his post after disappointing performance by Pakistan Hockey Team.

Awards and recognition

* Shahnaz Sheikh is rated among the 'Top 10 Pakistan Hockey Players of All Time'. * He received the

Pride of Performance The Pride of Performance ( ur, ), officially known as Presidential Pride of Performance, is an award bestowed by the Islamic Republic of Pakistan to recognize people with "notable achievements in the field of art, science, literature, sports, an ...

Award in 1990 from the President of Pakistan.Award for Shahnaz Sheikh on Pakistan Sports Board website
Retrieved 25 June 2021

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External links

Awards and recognition

See also

References

External links