TWO SILVER MEDALS OF THE WORLD CUP

The last international tournament of the season, World Cup in Acrobatic Gymnastics, ended at the National Gymnastics Arena of Azerbaijan. Athletes from Azerbaijan, Belarus, Israel, Kazakhstan, India, Russia and Ukraine attended the event. Competition among the athletes born in 2003 and older took place in various groups: men, women and mixed pairs, as well as men and women groups.

Azerbaijani national team included the bronze medallists of the last European Championship, Abdullah Al-Meshayihi - Ruhidil Gurbanly and Aghasif Rahimov - Nurjan Jabbarli (mixed pairs). Silver medallists of the 2016 world championship, Seymur Jafarov and Murad Akbarov, fought for medals in men's groups.

Scoring 29.646 points, a pair of Abdullah Al-Meshayihi - Ruhidil Gurbanly won silver medals. Russian couple Kirill Startsev - Victoria Aksenova (29.663 points) were awarded the gold medals, while the representatives of Belarus, Artur Belyakov and Olga Melnik, took the bronze medals.

The pair of Seymur Jafarov and Murad Akbarov took the second place for Azerbaijan with 28.600 points. Gold medallists in this group were also the athletes from Russia, Timofey Ivanov and Maxim Karavaev (29.182). Bronze medals were taken by the athletes from Kazakhstan, Daniel Diehl and Vadim Shulyar (28,583).

Head coach of the Azerbaijani national team Irada Gurbanova expressed her satisfaction with the performance of Azerbaijani gymnasts. "They did their best. Of course, we got not everything as planned. The guys could do better. After the competition, each coach is always unhappy, finds certain omissions. Before the performance, Murad Akbarov was very worried. We have hardly managed to make him relax. Yet he has managed to concentrate. Our athletes proved that they were in good shape. Now we are even better, and I feel that we are progressing well," Irada Gurbanova said.

She added that next year the team would play at the European Championships in Israel for the three sets of medals: separately in each exercise and in all-round competition. Head coach of our national team believes that her athletes will return from the continental championship with medals.

Silver medallist Seymur Jafarov also shared with us his impressions about the results of the Baku World Cup. "I knew that we would achieve a good result at the World Cup. The main thing is to set a goal. Murad Akbarov and I achieved our goal. We had mistakes too. But after all, err is human. We will work on our mistakes and will move forward only," Seymur said.

His partner Murad Akbarov admitted that he was very worried before the start. But this did not prevent him from concentrating on his performance. "Competitions were held in Azerbaijan, which placed great responsibility on us. But we had a strong support of our fans," Murad said.

The athletes noted that they had to do a lot of work to remedy the mistakes indicated by the head coach. The team has one goal: to become qualified for the 2019 European Championship.

Azerbaijan Gymnastics Federation (AGF) has successfully completed the last World Cup of this season. In 2019, the federation will have to hold an even more prestigious competition, World Cup in trampoline, gymnastics and rhythmic gymnastics in Baku.

In 2019, AGF organises for the first time the European championships in two types of gymnastics at once. On May 24-26, 2019, the strongest athletes in aerobics will gather in the capital of Azerbaijan to compete in the continental championship. On July 20-28, Baku will host the European Olympic Youth Festival as well. Both tournaments will also be held at the National Gymnastics Arena.

The last competition of the next year will be the World Rhythmic Gymnastics Championship. After 14 years, Baku will again become the venue for the world championship.

By the way, the three cups and the world championship scheduled for the next year in Baku will award licenses for the 2020 Olympic Games.