Bahrainis begin 2024 Paris Olympics qualification quest

TDT | Manama    

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Bahrain take on Kazakhstan today as they begin their Asian Men’s Qualification campaign for a place in the men’s handball tournament at the Paris Olympic Games 2024.

Eleven nations are in Doha vying for just the one direct spot at next year’s Olympiad.

The Bahrainis’ opening contest is scheduled for a 1pm start, Bahrain time, and it will be played at Duhail Handball Sports Hall at the Qatari capital.

Bahrain and Kazakhstan are in Group B for the preliminary stage of the qualifiers along with Iran, Kuwait and Japan.

Group A features Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, the UAE, India and China.

There are five games in all today.

At 11am, South Korea face the UAE; at 3pm, Saudi take on India; at 5pm, Japan play Iran; and at 7pm, Qatar face off with China.

The qualifiers are to be held until 28 October.

Following their match today, Bahrain next take on Japan tomorrow, after which there will be a rest day.

They return to action only on Sunday against Kuwait, and then after another rest day, complete the preliminaries against Iran on 24 October.

At the end of a single round-robin, only the top two teams from the two groups advance to the semi-finals, which are scheduled for 26 October.

The final and game for third place will then be held on the concluding day of action.

The runners-up from the Doha qualifiers will get another chance to book their tickets to Paris but must compete against other top handball nations from around the world in one of the three Olympic qualifying events.

These are set to be held in March of next year with 12 national teams in the fray. National team head coach Aron Kristjansson has a 19-player squad in the qualifiers.

Kristjansson guided Bahrain to the Kingdom’s first-ever Olympic men’s handball participation at the Tokyo Games in 2021, and he is hoping for a repeat success.

Tokyo was also the first time in history that Bahrain qualified for any team sport at the Olympics.