Foreign coaches being hired for national women football team

KARACHI: Softball Federation of Pakistan (SFP) has decided to acquire services of well acclaimed foreign trainers cum physiotherapists Kim Anne Buchholtz and Lesley De Koker for the national women football team, poised to participate in a series of international level events this year.

According to a SFP announcement Wednesday the federation's Secretary General Asif Azeem along with SFP's international affair's members Roman Ali Shaukat and Maqsood Ahmad, recently held meetings, in Dubai, with the two reputable sports trainers/physiotherapists from South Africa.

Efforts were said to be underway to finalize an agreement with the known professionals so as to help prepare the local women players participating in a softball series at Malaysia followed by 7th Asian Universities' Softball Championship at Philippine from May 8 to 18.

The national women football team was also said to play the 2nd Asian Softball Championship in China from October 22 to 27.

Trainers Kim Anne Buchholtz with an M. Phil degree in Physiotherapy, also doing Ph. D in the subject, alongwith Kim Anne a diploma holder in Sports Training and Physiotherapy are being convinced to train the local players in Pakistan.

"We will prefer the two trainers to train our players in Pakistan so that our teams, both men and women, could be able to improve their professional capacities," SFP Secretary General, Asif Azeem was quoted to have said.

Focus was said to help the national teams raise their Asian as well as World ranking in the sport.

Initial discussion with the two trainers were said to have been completed with equal attention to involve Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) who may further facilitate the process of acquiring services of qualified coaches and associated professionals pre-requisite for a world level team.