SECOND CHANCE

Rasad Ahmadov (80 kg) has won a place at the Beijing Olympics at the European tae kwon do qualification tournament in Istanbul. In reaching the final our athlete achieved his key objective and will now be going to his second Games. The same cannot be said for Niyamaddin Pasayev, who, to the surprise of experts, lost his first bout to Austrian Mark Manuel and will now be a spectator in Beijing.

Road to victory

Rasad began the tournament with a victory against Bruno Derlino of Monaco and met Frenchman Mamedy Doucara in the quarter-final. This contest was the toughest for Rasad, especially since the fight did not produce a winner in normal time and took a "golden point" to secure victory in overtime. In the semi-final Rasad beat Englishman Aaron Cook. Rasad's opponent in the final was his old friend and rival Bahri Tanrikulu who beat him in the Athens Olympics. However, in order to avoid injury the rivals decided not to take the fight to the wire and the contest had only just begun when the team's chief coach, Alakbar Imamaliyev, threw in the towel.

Rasad fully lived up to the expectations of the coaches, showing once again that he is the most consistent of the Azerbaijani tae kwon do athletes. Niyamaddin Pasayev (68 kg) really let the team down and was out of the competition before he had hardly begun. Austrian Mark Manuel proved himself an unbeatable opponent for our most successful fighter. The bout was entertaining - first one, then the other fighter took the lead and by the end of full time the scoreboard read 9:9. Success favoured Mark in overtime and he scored a "golden point". So Azerbaijan will be represented at the Olympics by just one tae kwon do athlete. The coaches concentrated more on the men, as they think that our women are not yet able to compete as equals in the international arena. Even foreign athletes do not help; Jang Eng Aliyeva (49 kg), who began the year as the trainer of the women's team, went to Turkey as a competing athlete. She lost her first fight to Manuela Bezzola of Switzerland and with that her hopes of an Olympic licence. The same fate awaited Nigar Haciyeva (57 kg) who lost in the first round to Georgian Yane Gognidze.

Meanwhile, Rasad Ahmadov acknowledged that it had been no easy task to win an Olympic licence. "Especially since we have been preparing non-stop this season. The year began with the World Championship in Beijing and after that it was essential not to lose fitness because of the Olympic world qualification tournament coming up in September in Manchester. After that came Istanbul. What can I say? Not only me but the whole team, our coaches and the federation's leadership, have worked for this licence. To achieve this goal you don't see your family for months as you are away at training camps. My child soon won't recognize his dad," the sportsman said ironically.

Ahmadov said that winning the licence is just the start of the process of winning an Olympic medal. "This is to be expected. If you have taken the first step, you must go on and take the second. Yes, it's my dream to win a medal in Beijing and I will do my very best to achieve this goal. I just have to be persistent and to continue training. This tournament was unusual in that every contest was decisive. So when you go out onto the dayang, you have to be mentally prepared for every fight as if it were the final. If you lose, you can give up hope of getting to the 

Games, so the stakes are very high. This explains my constrained performance in several fights, as there is psychological pressure." 

"The standard of tae kwon do has improved throughout the world and there is no longer a divide between favourites and outsiders," Rasad continued. "The results of the 2007 World Championship, where sportsmen from Mali, Afghanistan, Iraq and Croatia all won medals, are a clear example of this. They are all countries where no-one expected such a breakthrough. This is just further proof that predictions in sport are not easy. There are no easy opponents any more. The fans are used to us winning and were sure that the team would win Olympic places."

Professionalism and experience

At the same time the tae kwon do athlete thinks that he has grown as a professional since the last Olympics. "People change, they grow up, look at the world differently. Of course, I have gone through this process too; I have gained more experience over the past four years and my bones have become stronger," he says, laughing. "I am now at the peak of my powers, I recently turned 25. At the Athens Olympics I was 21, just a boy in the professional sense, and now I am a man." 

Niyamaddin Pasayev's defeat came as a real shock to the team, as he was a favourite for a trip to Beijing. "I still can't get over it, you know," the team's chief coach, Alakbar Imamaliyev, said. "Before extra time in the fight against Austrian Mark Manuel I warned him not to force things. But Niyamaddin decided to take the initiative, went on the attack and fell to a counterattack. It's a real shame as we really thought Niyamaddin could do it. He has often won important victories for the team, he's won the World Championship and twice won the European Championship but really let us down in Istanbul." The participant in the Athens Olympics will now have to be a spectator in Beijing and regret his missed chance to test his strength in the Games. Niyamaddin's result is a clear illustration of the old adage that in sport it is not the best man overall who wins but the man who is best at a given moment. Austrian Mark Manuel - and no-one expected him to be so fast - was better at that moment.

Talking about the performance of the women's team, Alakbar Imamaliyev said. "If we are talking about individuals, then Jang Eng Aliyeva (49 kg) was hampered by a lack of competition experience. After all, she has not competed for several years, as she has begun to work as a coach. It wasn't easy for her to get a result straight after her return to the dayang. At the same time Nigar Haciyeva (57 kg) got her first experience of competing in such competitions and we were not expecting a great deal from her." Nigar's inclusion in the team was last minute, as the coaches had initially planned to take to Istanbul Jin Sun Huseynova (67 kg), who last year won silver at the World Championship as a member of the Korean team. However, the World Tae kwon do Federation did not allow the Korean with an Azerbaijani passport to compete for her second home country. Jin Sun's debut has been postponed indefinitely and is shrouded in uncertainty.

At the same time Azerbaijan is the only post-Soviet country that managed to win a licence to Beijing in Istanbul. The hosts of the dayang set the tone at the tournament, winning the most licences for the country - four. With every year it becomes harder and harder for Azerbaijani tae kwon do athletes to retain their high rankings and compete for the prizes. Now all the Olympic hopes rest with Rasad Ahmadov who has the chance of success in Beijing. At any rate we would very much like to think so.