KARACHI: Quetta’s brilliant performances led them to a fine win in the Karachi Open Taekwondo Championship on Sunday while Khyber Pakhtunkhwa grabbed second position.

The 4-day Open Taekwondo Championship was held under the auspices of Sindh Taekwondo Association at Government Degree Girls College Sports Complex, Gulistan-e-Jauhar in which as many as 400 boys and girls from Karachi, Hyderabad, Sukkur, Mirpur Khas, Lahore, Multan, Peshawar, Kohat and Quetta participated. Quetta won the championship by scoring 161 points whereas KPK finished second with 128 points.

In the women’s event Karachi Tigers took the honours in the senior category after scoring 154 points while Karachi Champions got the second position with 120 points and Multan came third with 92 points.

Ali Haider of Karachi in the senior men’s event and Ambereen Shafiq in senior women’s event were declared Best Fighter of the championship. District West won the Cadet Championship with 104 points. District Central finished second with 88 points. The District Central players dominated the juniors and won the title with 110 points. District South, meanwhile, finished second with 98 points.

President South Asian Taekwondo Association Omar Saeed was the chief guest and distributed prizes and medals. He said that Karachi Open has become an excellent event in which players from all over the country are seen in action. He observed that new talent would emerge from such competitions.

Ahmed Chauhan, chairman of Pakistan Taekwondo School Association, said he was working hard to promote the sport of taekwondo from the grassroots level.

Secretary General of Pakistan Taekwondo Federation Murtaza Bangash, Media Advisor Pakistan Olympic Association Asif Azeem, VP of SOA Syed Mahfooz-ul-Haq, President Sindh Taekwondo Kamran Qureshi, Karachi Taekwondo President Muhammad Faraz Usman were also present.

Published in Dawn, February 16th, 2021