Young shooters walk same road as predecessors

Country's shooters will once again return from the Asia Olympic Qualifications empty handed after Robiul Islam wasted a near-final qualification opportunity in the 10m air rifle event of the Asian Championships in Jakarta yesterday.

Robiul missed out on the eight-shooter final round by 0.3 points after scoring 628 points in the qualification round. Fathur Gustafian of Indonesia, who qualified as the eighth shooter and earned an Olympic quota place, scored 628.3 points in qualification round.

"We were confident that Robiul would play the final and win a medal, especially due to the way he was performing in training," assistant coach Golam Shafiuddin Khan Shiplu told over phone from Jakarta.

"Had Robiul qualified, he would have had a chance to win a medal too as he usually plays the final better than qualification," Shiplu said. "Besides, out of the eight shooters in the final, five had already earned Olympic quota places previously and the shooter from Indonesia secured the quota despite finishing fourth in the final round."

Experienced Arnab Sharar also disappointed by scoring less than his Asian Games score as he finished 32nd with a score of 623.3 points while young Jidan Hossain finished 21st out of 55 competitors with a score of 625.4 points.

In women's 10m air rifle event, Shaira Arefin, Jafirah Chowdhury and Kamrunnhaar Koly finished 18th, 27th and 34th respectively among 62 participants.

Failing to replicate training performances in international competitions has long been an issue for our shooters and the trend seems to continue.

"There may be two reasons behind this issue. The first is a lack of participation in international competitions and the second one maybe inability to handle pressure," opined Commonwealth Games gold medallist Asif Hossain Khan.

"If shooters play less competitions, they would lack match temperament. Besides, the shooters compete among themselves in familiar environment, so when they compete against foreign shooters at international events, they can't handle the pressure," said the shooter-turned-coach.

Asif also said that a shooter may make good scores once or twice during practice, but that should not be given too much importance. What matters more is the average score.

"I think consistency is key to getting success and shooters should be given set targets to improve scores," said Asif.

Mustaque Wais, a member of Bangladesh Shooting Sport Federation and camp commandant, believes the lack of match temperament and lack of passion play key roles behind poor performances at international level.

Assistant coach Shiplu suggested increasing the number of shooters and tournaments to make domestic events more competitive so that the national shooters are pushed by each other for better performance.