The bleak state of country\u2019s athletics was evident as 39th National Athletics Championship was concluded on Saturday without a single new record, leaving very little optimism for medals in the forthcoming South Asian Games.\u00a0Bangladeshi athletes won only two silver medals and four bronze medals in the last edition of SA Games held in Dhaka in 2010 despite taking more than one year training.
\nLike the previous edition, Bangladesh Athletics Federation held this meet also with hand-timing as the electronic timer has been left malfunctioning for almost two years.
\nWithout using the electronic timer, the athletes, who wished to take part in the SA Games in January 2016 in India, alleged that they failed to know where their actual standard lies.
\nThe coaches and officials also appeared very pessimistic regarding the SA games as the performance of athletes could not impress them in any of the event.
\nKitab Ali, former national team coach, refused to comment on the performance of the athletes and only said, \u2018Athletes are born, not created. There is no alternate to find new talents.\u2019
\nThe veteran coach tried to compare the performances with the previous results.
\n\u2018Late sprinter Shah Alam won the 100m gold medal in the 1984 SAF Games clocking 10.7seconds but the current best sprinter Mezbah (Ahmed) clocked 11.13second in the World Athletics Championship,\u2019 he said.
\n\u2018Mahfuzur Rahman Mithu won gold in 110m hurdles in Sri Lanka in 2006 at 14.1 seconds, this time it was 14.4 in hand timing.\u2019
\nNot only 100m sprint, all the athletes displayed dismal performance in every events.
\nNoakhali coach Rafiq Ullah Akter Milon, who produced a good number of athletes in the past, could not hide his disappointment being unable to find a single athlete who could impress him with performance.
\n\u2018In the past, we had hope in the short distance sprints like\u2013 100m, 110m hurdles in both men\u2019s and women\u2019s catgeory as well as long jump as our standard was just a bit behind the best in the region.
\n\u2018But now the gap with other countries in these disciplines widened so much that we cannot realistically hope to get medals.\u2019
\nNazrul Islam Rumi, a former coach of BKSP, was not hopeful with the performance of the current athletes either.
\n\u2018We cannot be too hopeful with this type of performance,\u2019 he said.
\nSome experts blamed the timing of the meet as they believed the tough weather made the job difficult for athletes.
\n\u2018It was not the appropriate time for national championship, which should have been held in winter,\u2019 said Brojo Gopal Saha, BJMC camp commander-cum-coach.
\n\u2018If it was held a few months later, the results might have been a little better.\u2019
\nBrojo Gopal was not very optimistic but he did not completely discard the chance of winning medals in the SA Games.
\n\u2018It all depends on how the federation chooses players and prepares them for the SA Games. However, I don\u2019t see much hope in general,\u2019 he said.
\nBangladesh Army regained their top spot of medal tally with a total of 56 medals including 20 gold medals. Bangladesh Navy finished second with 28 medals including 15 gold medals.
\nBJMC was the only other team to win a gold medal.<\/p>\n

-With New Age<\/strong> input<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The bleak state of country\u2019s athletics was evident as 39th National Athletics Championship was concluded on Saturday without a single new record, leaving very little optimism for medals in the forthcoming South Asian Games.\u00a0Bangladeshi athletes won only two silver medals and four bronze medals in the last edition of SA Games held in Dhaka in … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_editorskit_title_hidden":false,"_editorskit_reading_time":0,"_editorskit_is_block_options_detached":false,"_editorskit_block_options_position":"{}","footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[209,199,12534],"yoast_head":"\n