Lahore, 21 October: Nine-times National title holder Pakistan International Airlines announced football team for the Pakistan Premier Football League (PPFL) 2010 clash against PMC Athletico Club Faisalabad at PMC Ground, Faisalabad on Saturday, 23 October (3 PM Kick Off). PIA is currently third in the 16-team table with 22 points, behind League leaders WAPDA (34 pts) and Afghan FC (26). PMC is in 12th position with 12 points.
“The most successful team in Pakistan Football Federation (PFF)’s 62-year history, PIA’s football team have the honor of winning the National Championship nine times and we will go all out to regain past identity in domestic soccer ” said former Pakistani and PIA coach Tariq Lutfi who has been appointed as manager of recharged PIA football team. He himself was part of several PIA’s team that won the National event as player and coach from 70s to 90s.”
Quetta-born Nasr Ullah Khan, who was declared MVP of PPFL and 19th NFCC last year will lead the team while NFCC 2009 Top scorer with eight goals Shakir Lashari and Bilal Rafiq – best keeper of 18th NFCC 2008- are also among the players.
The team is comprised of Nasr Ullah Khan ©, Shakir Lashari (vc), Syed Sultan Ali, Bilal Rafiq, Abu Bakar, Abdul Jabbar Sr, Abdul Jabbar Jr, Zubair Moazzam, Ali Ehsan, Abdul Ghaffar, Nadeem Tariq, Ali Adeem Shahzad, Liaquat Ali, Nazir Ahmed, Zeeshan Ali, Muhammad Ishtiaq, Saeed Ahmed, Muhammad Hanif, Muhammad Arif, Imran Khan Hashmi, Zahoor Ahmed, Adnan Abbasi, Haji Muhammad, Muhammad Irfan, Imran, Wasim Ullah, Ali Nawaz, Ali Muhammad, Hasnain Abbas, Rizwan, Saddam Hussain, Sabir Lashari Zohaib Ahmed, Jaffar Ali,
PIA were absent from PFF’s events from 2004 to 2006 as after Quetta’s 16th PFF President in 2003, the soccer team of PIA was disbanded but later on PIA Sports management took serious look into the latest growing activities of soccer and decided to re-activate the team that put up brilliant display in domestic soccer from 1971 to 2003,” added Lutfi. PFF enrolled them in Pakistan Premiership 2007 by virtue of splendid display in yester years and they finished sixth, eighth and sixth in three editions from 2007 to 2009 respectively. Despite, nine titles in National Championship, PIA managed only one win in National Football Challenge Cup (NFCC) when they won the second edition at Quetta 26 years ago.
Pakistan Premier Football League 2010………POINTS TABLE after 96 Encounters
Teams P W D L GF GA Pts
WAPDA 12 11 1 – 35 6 34
Afghan FC 12 8 2 2 20 8 26
PIA 12 6 4 2 17 10 22
Army 12 6 3 3 17 8 21
KPT 12 6 2 4 20 17 20
PEL 12 6 2 4 18 18 20
KRL 12 5 4 3 12 8 19
PAF 12 5 3 4 13 11 18
Navy 12 4 4 4 11 14 16
KESC 12 4 3 5 14 14 15
Baloch FC 12 2 6 4 10 13 12
PMC 12 3 3 6 10 17 12
NBP 12 2 5 5 12 20 11
Young Blood 12 2 2 8 11 29 8
HBL 12 1 2 9 7 19 5
SSGC 12 1 2 9 12 27 5
Matches to come: 144