CHENNAI: Wrestling Federation of India’s (WFI’s) decision to send entries ahead of the conclusion of selections trials meant four wrestlers were forced to delay their departure for the upcoming World Championships scheduled in Kazakhstan from September 14 to 22.
While their respective teams left for the preparatory camp in Kazakhstan, these wrestlers including two women can leave only on Tuesday for the event, which will also serve as first qualifier for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
The women’s team except Vinesh Phogat left on August 29 while the Greco-Roman team departed for Kazakhstan the next day. The men’s freestyle team, sans Bajrang Punia, Jitender Kumar and Sushil Kumar, flew out on Sunday. The first two are in Russia preparing for the event while Sushil is expected to join them in a day or two.
The WFI sent a tentative list of participants to the United World Wrestling (UWW) even before the second round of trials held in non-Olympic weight categories for men and women on August 19 and 20 respectively. The August 20 event also saw trials in the 74kg weight category wherein two-time Olympic medallist Sushil qualified for the Worlds.
The last round of trials saw a couple of wrestlers both in men’s and women’s categories making it to the team against WFI’s expectations. Parveen (92) and Karan (70) defeated their opponents in the final while Komal Bhagwan Gole (72) and Lalita (55) grabbed the spots in women’s category.
Given the unexpected results, the federation was left with no option than to revise the list and seek invitation from the organisers for these wrestlers, which in turn led to the delay in procurement of visas.
“These four wrestlers will leave on Tuesday. Pooja, who stayed back to attend the sports awards ceremony, will fly out on September 7,” Vinod Tomar, assistant secretary WFI said.