TDT | Manama
Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com
Bahrain stormed into the semi-finals of the Asian Men’s Qualifier for the 2024 Paris Olympics men’s handball tournament last night.
Bahrain secured a spot in the tournament with a hard-fought 28-24 victory over Iran at Duhail Sports Hall in Doha, Qatar, and finished second in Group B of the tournament, earning them a ticket to the top four. I got it.
There, they will take on Group A winners Qatar in an exciting clash between the two finalists of the 2019 continental qualifiers held in the run-up to the Tokyo Olympics.
A brilliant rally late in the second half that saw Bahrain score four goals proved decisive in yesterday’s hard-fought battle.
After Iran closed to a one-point lead, captain Hussein Al Sayad’s goal sparked Bahrain’s rapid advance.
A fast break from Qassim Kambar and two consecutive shots from Mujtaba Al Zaimour gave the national team some leeway with less than five minutes remaining.
Iran was able to reduce the gap to three points in the next few minutes, but fell just short.
The semi-final between Bahrain and Qatar was also a rematch of the recently concluded Hangzhou Asian Games gold medal match, where Bahrain lost to Qatar and had to settle for silver.
Bahrain needs to beat its Gulf rivals to have a chance of qualifying for the Olympics for the second year in a row.
Only the winners of the Asian Men’s Qualification Tournament will directly qualify for the Men’s Handball Tournament to be held in Paris next year.
The runners-up will be given another chance to book their tickets, but will have to compete against other top handball countries from around the world in one of three qualifying events next year.
After yesterday’s result, Bahrain finished behind Group B leaders Japan and will face South Korea in the semi-finals.
Both juicy matches are scheduled for tomorrow. Bahrain’s victory over Iran forced its people to dig deep to overcome tough challenges from their opponents.
Iran went into the break with a 16-12 lead, but the Iranians continued to fight for most of the final 30 minutes.
Iran came close to tying the score in the closing stages, but the Iranians fought back, with a particularly important spurt turning a narrow 22-21 lead into a 26-21 cushion.
With last night’s result, Bahrain finished the group stage with 3 wins and 1 loss.
They also had wins against Kazakhstan and Kuwait, but both teams lost to Japan by a heartbreaking one-point difference.
Following tomorrow’s best-of-four matches, the final and third-place match will be held on Saturday’s final day of qualifying.
Bahrain will make a historic debut in Tokyo 2021 as they aim to qualify for their second consecutive Olympics.
This was not only the first time that the national team participated in the men’s handball competition at the Olympic Games, but also the first time that the Kingdom participated in the Olympic team competition.