ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s Shah Hussain Shah has climbed five more positions to 39th spot in the Olympic rankings, the highest-ever any South Asian judoka could earn.

In his pursuit for a place at the 2020 Olympics, playing in Osaka Grand Slam, Shah ascended to 39th position in recently-updated Olympic ranking list, said a press release issued here.

Shah, who was previously at 44th position in Olympic qualifying ranking with 746 points, lost against world No.4 Aaron Wolf of Japan in the pre-quarterfinals.

He secured 160 points in the contest and has accumulated 904 points thus far ahead of his Asian continent rivals.

Retired Col Junaid Alam, president of the Pakistan Judo Federation (PJF), said the federation was giving all-out support to Shah for his Olympic run.

“We are not sending any other judoka anywhere besides Shah,” he said.

He said judo qualifying for Olympics was unlike other sports as there only 3 to 4 Olympic qualifiers, contested by an athlete or a team.

“A federation has to field a judoka in maximum number of International Judo Federation (IJF) calendar events of last 2 years qualifying period with each having different weightage,” he explained.

“If you miss any event the others get full benefit and gets a chane to improve ranking. In the last four months, Shah was sent to participate in 7 different championships round the globe.”

He said the PJF has planned to send Shah on a six-week tour of Europe in February-March where he would not only attend the IJF training camp but will also participate in all grand prix and grand slam tournaments.

“There was no support from any quarter so far despite so many requests to all concerned,” he said.

Published in Dawn, November 28th, 2019