Incheon, South Korea: The President of the UAE Athletics Association (UAE AA) has called for a post-mortem on the country’s sports systems following a below-par performance at the 2014 Asian Games here.
The UAE will end the fortnight-long event, which officially closes on Saturday, with four medals — one gold and three bronze.
Shaikh Juma Bin Dalmouk Al Maktoum started the ball rolling with third place in the men’s double trap shooting, while the gold went to Aliah Saeed Mohammad in the women’s 10,000 metres.
Marwan Abdullah Al Mazmi in the kata competition and experienced bowler Shaker Ali Hussain then added two more bronze medals on Thursday.
Much was expected from Mohammad and Betlhem Desalegn in the women’s 5,000 metres, but the UAE women were left behind in a fast race that saw neighbours Bahrain finish with a one-two, while China took the bronze.
Before leaving for Incheon, UAE AA boss Ahmad Al Kamali had insisted his squad of four track and field athletes were capable of bringing home “at least two medals”.
“Yes, it has been a disappointing Games despite Aliah’s gold medal. The first thing all the presidents of the associations should now be doing is putting our heads together as one and carrying out a sort of post-mortem to see why we have failed in delivering on the promises,” Al Kamali told Gulf News.
“To start with, we are happy with the gold medal we’ve won as it shows that our runner is right there at the top. However, the performances of the others have been disappointing.
“But then, you’ve got to always make the difference between a small country like the UAE against other countries like Bahrain and Qatar who have full teams of top-level athletes. So if one of the favourites does not win, then there is always another who is capable of surprising with a medal. They have a suitable back-up, while we don’t. And that is the difference.
“We rely on individuals to bring in the medals, whereas the other countries have teams that they can fall back on. But we still need to sit down, evaluate and reflect on whether we are moving in the right direction. There is not much time left as the next Olympic Games [2016] are just round the corner.”
