South Asian Games: Pakistan add four gold medals, takes tally to 24

Karachi: Pakistani athletes have bagged four more gold medals to take the tally to 24 in the 13th South Asian Games (SAG) on Saturday.

Pakistan won gold medals in athletics, weightlifting and wrestling competitions.

The day started with a remarkable performance by Javelin thrower Arshad Nadeem who won gold medal in the game setting a record 86.29 throw --- the best ever throw by any athlete in the South Asian Games competition.

Arshad’s brilliant performance was evident by the fact that four out of his five throws were over 80m. His sequence of attempts was 78.74, 86.29, 83.17, 85.86 and 82.13.

Pakistan’s tally increased further when weightlifter Usman Amjad Rathore lifted a total weight of 330kg to win the men’s 102kg competition. Usman lifted 150 in snatch and 180 in clean & jerk.

Wrestlers Inayatullah and Abdul Rehman also won gold medals for Pakistan by winning wrestling competition in men’s 70kg and 79kg, respectively.

However, Zaman Anwar and Tayyab Raza went down fighting in final bouts and earned silver medals in 97kg and 125 kg wrestling contests, respectively.

Female weightlifter Rabbia Razzaq also won a silver medal after lifting 141kg in women’s 87kg contest. Rabbia lifted 63kg in snatch and 86kg in clean & jerk to win her first silver medal in SAG.

In shooting competition, Pakistan team, comprised of Ghulam Mustafa Bashir, Khalil Akhtar and Maqbool Hussain Tabassum, bagged silver in 25m rapid fire pistol team competition. GM Bashir also won the individual silver medal in rapid fire pistol event.

Female sprinters Sahib-e-Asra, Najma Parveen, Rabia Ashiq and Aneela Gulzar bagged silver medal in women’s 4x400m relay. Men’s team comprised of Umar Sadat, Mehboob Ali, Abdul Moeed, Nokar Hussain earned bronze medal in men’s 4x400 relay.

Farhan Mehboob, Faiza Zafar and Madina Zafar won bronze medals in squash events while Ghufran Adil and Nadra Raees won bronze medals in 10m rifle mixed event.

Pakistani athletes have, so far, won 24 gold, 30 silver and 38 bronze medals. This is Pakistan’s best performance in the last three editions of SAG. They had won 12 gold medals at Guwahati in 2016 and 19 Gold medals at Dhaka in 2010.