Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) president Mir Tariq Hussain Bugti resigned on Thursday and announced a two-year ban on national team captain Ammad Shakeel Butt, as fallout from the mismanagement of the team’s Australia tour continues. 

Bugti addressed a press conference, confirming that he had forwarded his resignation to Prime Minister (PM) Shehbaz Sharif. The ban on Butt covers both domestic and international hockey.

The developments follow reports that PM Sharif had already decided to sack PHF’s team management, including Bugti and Secretary General Rana Mujahid, after a Pakistan Sports Board inquiry into the Australia tour.

The PSB inquiry committee, comprising CFO Hasnat Ahmed as chairman and members Saeed Ahmed Chaudhry and Rana Nasrullah, completed its investigation in a single day and submitted its report to PSB Director General Yasir Pirzada on Wednesday.

The inquiry centered on the team’s troubled stay in Hobart, where the PHF arranged lodging for only seven days and housed players more than an hour and a half outside the city. 

Initial hotel bookings collapsed after the PHF failed to make payments, forcing management to scramble for last-minute rooms through an online platform, with four to five players sharing each room.

The bookings did not even cover the full duration of the tour, and members of the local Pakistani community eventually stepped in to arrange alternative accommodation and meals for the squad.

Upon returning to Lahore on Tuesday, Butt directed his anger squarely at the management when speaking to media at the airport.