ASIAN BEACH GAMES – Bahrain’s rosters for 3x3 basketball and beach handball are set for the sixth Asian Beach Games, set to take place in Sanya, China, from April 22 to 30.
The team line-ups were announced yesterday by the Bahrain Olympic Committee (BOC).
The kingdom’s athletes are amongst 45 delegations from across the continent who will be competing in the highly anticipated event.
There will be 14 sports comprising 15 disciplines and 61 events in the meeting.
Aside from 3x3 basketball and beach handball, Bahrain are also taking part in beach wrestling and open water swimming.
Their participating athletes for those two sports have yet to be revealed.
The 3x3 basketball national team features the quartet of Bogdan Dragovic, Milos Supica, Nasser Al Mosawi, and Austin Ajukwa.
Dragovic and Supica were part of the Bahraini squad that won the men’s gold medals at the Gulf Basketball Association 3x3 Championships in Muscat, Oman, in November of last year.
Al Mosawi was a regular for Bahraini outfit Seef in last year’s Fiba 3x3 World Tour along with Dragovic, while Ajukwa will be making his debut for the kingdom in the half court.
The team manager is Bahrain Basketball Association official Ahmed Elias.
Meanwhile, a 10-member beach handball team was selected for Sanya.
The nationals will be spearheaded by Bilal Basham, Adam Isa Alnasheet, Ali Alhayki, and Mahdi Ali, while the rest of the line-up includes Ali Almawlani, Sayed Ahmed Faiq, Kamil Ali, Mahdi Ali, Komail Mahfoudh, and goalkeepers Abdulla Alzaimour and Ali Ghassan.
Coached by Hussain Al Qaidoom, a number of the team’s members were part of the Bahraini contingent that won the silver medals at the third GCC Beach Games in Muscat in April of last year.
Aside from the four sports Bahrain will be competing in, also set to be a part of the sixth Asian Beach Games are beach soccer, beach kabaddi, beach athletics, dragon boat, jiu-jitsu, sailing, speed sports climbing, teqball, aquathlon triathlon, and beach volleyball. Water polo is another discipline under the sport of aquatics.
The kingdom’s delegation at the sixth Asian Beach Games will be headed by chef de mission and BOC executive director of operations Ahmed Abdulghaffar, along with deputy chef de mission and BOC Arab and international relations head Maryam Mardana.
This year’s edition of the Asian Beach Games will be the first time the multi-sport event is to be held in a decade – with the previous occasion happening in 2016 in Da Nang, Vietnam.
Bahrain also participated then, winning two gold medals – one in bodybuilding through Ali Abdulrasool and another in jiu-jitsu with Ali Monfaradi.
The kingdom’s senior men’s beach handball national team were also in action.
They finished an impressive fifth overall behind the top three of Qatar, Oman, and Pakistan, and fourth-placed Vietnam.
In the past five editions of the Asian Beach Games, Bahrain have bagged a total of 11 medals, including seven gold, three silver, and one bronze.
The national delegation’s best-ever participation was in the fourth Asian Beach Games in Phuket, Thailand in 2014, when they came away with five gold and two silver medals.
patrick@gdnmedia.bh
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