Rooba Al-Omari and Ahmed Meshaima to head Bahrain team at 2020 Paralympic Game

TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Rooba Al-Omari and Ahmed Meshaima will be leading Bahrain’s Olympic medal hunt at the 2020 Paralympic Games which begins in Tokyo next week.

The athletes and the delegates yesterday left for Tokyo to begin preparing ahead of the opening ceremony scheduled for Tuesday. The games will see about 4,400 athletes from 160 teams compete against each other for the next 11 days in 540 events.

Apart from the athletes, Bahrain’s delegation includes Shaikh Mohamed Duaij Khalifa Al Khalifa, the head of the delegation and Bahrain Paralympic Committee, Ali Al Majed, the Secretary-General of the Paralympic Committee, Latifa Buheji, the director of the delegation, Iman Hassan, the technical director, and Hassan Muftah, the coach.

Al-Omari and Meshaima will be pushing for medals in the discus throw F55 and Javelin F39 events, respectively. Shaikh Mohamed stressed to the members of the departing delegation the need to adhere to health instruction and procedures set by the Tokyo Olympic Committee. He wished all success to the Paralympic team to achieve the best results in the global event.

Aim is medal

Ali Al Majed had asserted that the two athletes are not there to just make the numbers, but are their best bet for a medal at the Paralympic Games.

“We are very excited that we are able to be a part of this huge event and believe that the two qualified Bahraini Para athletes will do their very best. We have faith in both our Para athletes and with God’s will, both will bring a medal home,” said Al Majed. In Rio 2016 too, Bahrain had fielded two women Para athletes, Alomari and Fatema Nedham. The latter won gold in London 2012 and Rio 2016 Paralympics in the women’s shot put F53.

First gold in Seoul

Bahrain started participating in the Paralympics in 1984 but won its first gold medal four years later in Seoul, with Khaled Al Saqer winning the men’s slalom in the 1A category.

His compatriot Ali Alhasan took bronze in the same event, while Adel Sultan took a silver medal in the 100m. In 1992 at the Barcelona Games, Al Saqer carried his form and won the country’s only medal, a bronze in the discus (THW2-3).

Bahrain then went dry without a medal in the next Games in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, but at the Sydney 2000 Games, thanks to Ayman Al Heddi and Ahmed Kamal, Bahrain obtained silver and a bronze, respectively, in the discus and the shot put events.

At Athens 2004, Ahmed Meshaima managed a sliver in the shot put (F37).

Nedham broke the jinx

The next two games in Beijing and London Bahrain couldn’t make it to the podium, but Fatema Nedham broke the jinx at the Rio Games with a gold in the women’s shot put F53 with a throw of 4.76 metres.

In the process, she also became Bahrain’s first female Paralympic athlete to win a medal at the Paralympic Games. And was also the third Bahraini woman athlete to ever participate in the sporting showpiece