Like Syeda Sadia Sultana, Rabbi Hasan Munna of BKSP also used the new rule of shooting to perfection and made his first participation in any national tournament memorable after overcoming star shooter Abdullah Hel Baki at the eighth Bangladesh Games in Dhaka on Friday.
Rabbi, who is waiting for his Secondary School Certificate result like Sadia, went through to the final round as the last competitor with 582 points in the shoot-off of the most attractive event in shooting, the 10m air rifle.
Meanwhile, Baki of Dhaka Rifles Club finished first with 594 points out of 600 but failed to maintain his consistency in the last four shots of the shoot-off and ended on 203.6 points while Rabbi confirmed the gold with 204.1 points out of 209.
Mahmudul Hasan Sojib of Comilla Rifles Club earned the bronze medal with 182.1 points. Asif Hossain Khan, the Commonwealth Games winning shooter failed to reach the final with 576 points although he claimed that he was suffering from a neck injury before the event started.
Baki, the favourite contender, lead the shoot-off until the 16th shot out of 20 but Rabbi recovered well to put Baki behind in the last four shots.
The rule, which came into effect in January this year, made the score of the qualifying round insignificant
and doubled the number of shots from 10 to 20 in the final round, whose score only came into reckoning in determining the three medalists.
17-year old shooter Rabbi was admitted to BKSP four years ago in the cricket discipline but failed in his pursuit of his dream. He was then entered in the shooting discipline and finally took up the rifle as a youngster.
‘Before participating in the Bangladesh Games, I did not even think about the gold medal. I was just concentrating on my own game. After 16 shots, I thought if I carried on playing my natural game, there might be a good chance for me to win the gold medal and luckily I did it,’ said Rabbi.
Rabbi’s coach Asbab Ali Foyez was confident with his pupil before the final got underway as the trainer claimed that Rabbi had always shown his potential in the shoot-off.
‘In the practice sessions, he (Rabbi) always scored 580 to 585 points but in the shoot-off he used to put all the participants behind him that is why when he went through to the final I predicted that he
might obtain the gold medal,’ said Foyez, who took charge of the BKSP shooters’ dormitory recently.
-With New Age input
