LAHORE - Secretary Sports and Youth Affairs Punjab Asadullah Faiz inaugurated five international-standard tennis courts adjacent to tennis stadium at Nishtar Park Sports Complex on Thursday.
DG Sports Punjab Muhammad Tariq Qureshi, Director Sports Nadeem Qaiser, Director Youth Affairs Syed Omair Hasan, Deputy Directors Rauf Bajwa and Chand Perveen, DSO Tanveer Shah, PLTA Secretary Rashid Malik (SBP head coach), tennis ace Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi, top national male and female tennis players Aqeel Khan and Ushna Sohail and a large number of tennis officials and enthusiasts were also present on this occasion.
Secretary Sports Asadullah Faiz and DG Sports Punjab Tariq Qureshi also witnessed exhibition matches contested between Aisam Qureshi and Aqeel Khan and female tennis players Ushna Suhail and Noor Malik.
Speaking on the occasion, Rashid Malik and national tennis stalwarts Aisam and Aqeel thanked SBP and Punjab Sports Department for launching international standard tennis facility. “Sports Board Punjab has done its job by building world-class tennis courts, now it is the players’ job to work hard and win glories for the country.
“These days young players are getting top class tennis facilities which were not available to us. The tennis courts have modern facilities which are very pleasing to see. Hopefully, the tennis kids will get benefit from this international-standard facility and will train hard under able guidance of SBP coaches and excel at higher level,” they added.
Secretary Sports Asadullah Faiz said it is a matter of great pleasure that a state-of-the-art tennis facility has been launched for the talented tennis players of the province. “These courts are equipped with all international level facilities and now we will be able to organize international level tennis tournaments at our own venues.”
Asadullah said that Punjab Sports Department has completed its responsibility and now its obligation of our coaches, trainers and young male and female tennis players to avail these facilities to the maximum and polish their skills. “The main objective of these modern tennis courts and academy to groom young players from the age of 5 to 10 up to U-12, U-13 and U-16. In this way we will be able to produce several tennis stars in future,” he added.
He said that this is the first tennis academy in the public sector which has been built according to international standards. “Four separate training courts have been built for junior players in the tennis academy. Punjab Sports Department is organizing three major tennis events - Punjab Open Tennis, National Tennis Tournament and Asian Junior Tennis Championship in near future.”
DG SBP Tariq Qureshi said that the talented players will be provided top level sports facilities so that they may win laurels for the country in international sports competitions. “Bringing youngsters towards sports activities is our mission and we will utilise all our resources for this purpose.”
