Nigeria’s Performance In US Taekwondo Open Excites Coach

Kano State Taekwondo Coach, Ibrahim Yahuza, on Thursday, commended the performance of the Nigerian taekwondoists at the recent US Open Taekwondo Championship in Las Vegas, US.

The country was represented by three taekwondoists at the championship held between February 19 and 23, namely: Usman Suleiman (58 kg), Shehu Bello (74kg) and Ismaila Mohammed (80 kg).

Yahuza told Tidesports in Lagos that the athletes performed creditably.

“As far as we are concerned, the outing is a success, so far so good, we went with a team of three guys.

“And one of the guys in the 58kg class was able to reach up to quarter-finals. He fought with two US athletes and he defeated them. In the first fight 15-2, in the second fight 8-1 and he lost against Costa Rica at the quarter-finals and the other two guys lost in their first fights.

“So by our standard, it’s success because what I’m daring of to know as a coach is to expose our

athletes to a world class competition.

“So that when the world championship comes we believe we are ripe enough to win something because they never had this opportunity. They are all local and national champions.

“And when you go to international championships, the standard is different, in terms of organisation, in terms of the competitors – very high competitors.

“So, when we begin to have this opportunity, we take them to German Open, Belgium Open when the world championships come, then our priority will change because our athletes are a threat and they are exposed, they’ve gained the necessary exposure so by our standard and by their performance; We’d say they have done wonderfully well.”

The coach also appealed to the government to sponsor programmes that would enable the athletes to participate in future competitions to improve their skills.