IJF to manage coach for Pakistan

KARACHI: International Judo Federation (IJF) has promised that it will manage a foreign coach for Pakistan in near future, a senior official of Pakistan Judo Federation (PJF) said on Monday.

“IJF has told us that it will arrange a foreign coach for us as we direly need a better coach to prepare our lot for the next year’s Asian Games,” PJF vice-president Masood Ahmed told The News. Masood said that IJF had given the PJF an indication that the coach could be from Romania.

“It is not yet confirmed but we have got an indication from the international body that it may arrange a Romanian coach,’ the official added. The Asian Games would be hosted by Indonesia in Palembang and Jakarta from August 18 to September 2, 2018. The official said that IJF would also contribute in payment to the coach.

Meanwhile Masood also revealed that the Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) had asked PJF for submitting a plan for the 2020 Olympics. “The PSB has asked us to file a plan for the 2020 Tokyo Games and later this week we will submit it,” he said.

He said that PJF would be focusing on three players for Olympics including Olympian Shah Hussain, Amina Toyoda and Qaiser Khan. Both Shah and Amina are Tokyo-based and are rated as the country’s best seeds in their respective weights.

Shah last year had made Olympics debut in Rio after he had qualified for the world’s most prestigious spectacle on continental quota.Masood said that Qaiser would have to play Youth Olympics qualifiers, adding, every effort would be made to prepare him rightly for the mission.

“From January to July 2018 there will be qualifiers for Youth Olympics and we would want Qaiser to play in minimum three international events during the same period which may help him to make a cut for the Youth Olympics,” the official said. Youth Olympics would be held in Buenos Aires, Argentina, from October 6-18, 2018. Masood was confident that Qaiser had a qualifying chance. “No doubt he is a gutsy judoka and I am hopeful he will qualify,” said Masood, also a former PJF secretary.

He also informed that PJF also plans to send its three to four top players abroad for training. “We had requested Mongolia but it did not reply. Now we are in contact with Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan and hopefully we will be able to strike a deal with any nation for our athletes’ foreign training,” Masood said.

“Shah needs training in the Russian states as there he will learn new things and attacking game which is very important for him to succeed at any major stage,” the official said.

Shah in Rio 2016 had exited in the first round. He is also the first Pakistani judoka who has got the honour of representing his country in Olympics.His father Hussain Shah has got bronze medal for Pakistan in boxing in 1988 Seoul Olympics and is also the only Pakistani to have done so.