LAHORE: Young and promising players, Asam Haider and Hassan Akbar, products of Dar Hockey Academy, are set to lead green shirts in Kakamigahara, Japan.
Geography, they say, is not destiny. For two young men from a tiny town in Kasur district, population barely 150,000, that truism has never felt more apt. Asam Haider and Hassan Akbar – captain and vice-captain respectively of the Pakistan Under-18 hockey team – have put their hometown on the national map. The duo will lead the green shirts at the Under-18 Asia Hockey Cup, which commences in Kakamigahara, Japan, on May 29. For a town with only one hockey club – the City Club – and no synthetic turf of its own, producing two national captains simultaneously is nothing short of extraordinary. But Kot Radha Kishan’s hockey story did not begin with this generation. It began with a big brother.
The first player from Kot Radha Kishan to don the coveted green shirt was Abdul Rahman, who debuted for the Pakistan Juniors in 2021. His talent and perseverance earned him promotion to the senior national team in 2023-2024 – a meteoric rise that inspired an entire town.
Abdul Rahman was a product of the Dar Hockey Academy in Lahore, widely recognized as Pakistan’s biggest reservoir of hockey talent for more than a decade. The academy, known for its rigorous training regimen and holistic support, identified Rahman’s potential early and honed it into international quality. For his younger brother Asam, watching Abdul Rahman’s journey was not a source of envy but of inspiration. “If he could do it, so could I,” Asam recalls thinking. In 2022, he followed the same path.
Asam Haider joined the Dar Hockey Academy in 2022, stepping onto the same synthetic turf where his brother had trained. The progress was rapid. By early 2025, he had represented Pakistan Juniors in matches against the junior sides of Germany and Oman – valuable exposure that tested his skills against European opposition.
Later that year, Asam featured for Pakistan in the Under-18 Asia Cup in Dazhou, China, where the team finished as runners-up. That experience – competing in a high-pressure continental tournament – has prepared him for the leadership role he now assumes.
Asked about the weight of captaincy, Asam is characteristically humble. “It is an honour, but the responsibility is shared,” he says. “I have Hassan beside me, and we have both come through the same system. We understand each other’s game.”
Hassan Akbar shares almost identical credentials. Also a student of the Dar Hockey Academy since 2022, he has trained alongside Asam for four years, developing not just skills but a partnership that now extends to leadership. The upcoming Under-18 Asia Cup in Japan will be Hassan’s first appearance in national colours – a debut that arrives with the added weight of the vice-captaincy. For a player who has never represented Pakistan before, the leap from academy to national leadership is unusual. But those who have watched Hassan train insist the selection is merited.
“He is calm under pressure,” says a Dar Academy coach. “He reads the game well, communicates constantly, and leads by example. Those qualities matter more than caps.”
Hassan himself deflects praise toward the academy that shaped him. “Everything I know about hockey, I learned at Dar,” he says. “The free board and lodging, the playing kits, the superb training on synthetic turf – without these, players like us from small towns would never have a chance.”
The duo’s leadership credentials were recently reinforced when they were part of the Customs team that won the national under-18 championships about a month ago. Remarkably, eight members of that victorious team were products of the Dar Hockey Academy – an indication of the institution’s dominance at the junior level.
Customs’ triumph was not merely a team victory; it was an academy showcase. Asam and Hassan played pivotal roles, and their performances caught the attention of national selectors ahead of the Asia Cup.
