ISLAMABAD, Feb 3: Pakistan’s weightlifting coach from Bulgaria, Alexander Marinov is due to return home following the postponement of SAF Games that were scheduled in March.

Muzaffar Qureshi, secretary of the Pakistan Weightlifting Federation (PWF), said Sunday that with the closure of the SAF Games secretariat in Islamabad, Marinov was being relieved of his duties by the sports board.

Marinov, who took up the task of coaching the national weightlifters in April 2000, was being paid by the SAF Games Organising Committee.

Qureshi felt that had the Games been staged in October last, the performance of the weightlifters trained by Marinov would have been outstanding. “The unfortunate first postponement upset the momentum of the lifters.”

Praising Marinov, Qureshi said that he was a good coach. “The federation wanted to have him till this year’s Commonwealth and Asian Games but then the decision to send him back was not made by us.”

He pointed out that the strength of the training camp which will start from March 1 had also been reduced from 16 to 10. Qureshi added that the PWF would try its best to achieve good results in the Manchester Commonwealth Games and the Asiad in Pusan.

“We plan to send four lifters to the Commonwealth Games and six for the Asiad and I am confident that they would do well.”

Meanwhile the 50th National Championship is set to begin here Monday at the Pakistan Sports Complex with as many as 57 weightlifters vying for honours.

The competing units in this two-day championship are defending champions Wapda, Railways, Army, Police, Punjab, NWFP, Balochistan and Islamabad. Sindh and UGC have not sent in their entries.