Foreign training awaits approval
Five months after being granted Olympic Solidarity Scholarships ahead of the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, some Bangladeshi shooters, archers and swimmers are still at home waiting for final approval from the Olympic Solidarity Committee (OSC).
Four shooters, two archers and one swimmer were awarded three-year long scholarship in September by the OSC, which is supposed to evaluate the improvement of those athletes every fourth months until the start of the Tokyo Olympics, but the archers and swimmers are still waiting to get final approval to fly out to Switzerland and Japan respectively.
“The four shooters – Shakil Ahmed, Anowar Hossain, Risalatul Islam and Umme Zakia Sultana -- have been training at our own training centre under the supervision of foreign coaches. However, we wanted to send them aboard for better training but we did not get the approval from concerned authority,” Bangladesh Shooting Sport Federation's chief operational officer Mustaque Waise said, adding that OSC would provide US$500 per month for each shooter.
Archer Ruman Sana is supposed to train at the World Archery Excellence Centre in Switzerland and his teammate Beauty Roy is supposed to train in Bangladesh while swimmer Ariful Islam is supposed to train in NOC Japan Training Centre.
“We have completed everything to send Ruman to Germany. We are just awaiting the final approval from the World Archery Association,” Bangladesh Archery Federation's general secretary Kazi Razibuddin Ahmed Chapal said, adding that they would arrange for training at home if they can rope in German coach Martin Fredrick under the Vision Tokyo 2020 project.
Bangladesh Swimming Federation's general secretary BM Saif informed that they were ready to send Ariful to Japan, but they are also waiting for approval from FINA.
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