When this article appears, javelin thrower Arshad Nadeem’s final result would have come out. The country’s premier athlete blasted his way into the Tokyo Olympics javelin throw finals after finishing at the summit in his group at the qualification stage on August 4 with a throw of 85.16 metre, the third best in his promising career.From day one he was the sole medal hope of Pakistan. The statistics of the throwers who qualified for the finals showed that the finals would be absorbing.

Arshad excelled in the qualification phase where even some global stars struggled.

Arshad, undoubtedly, is a future prospect. Irrespective of the final results in the Tokyo Games, this athlete needs the country’s full support. He can play easily three more Olympics so Pakistan should invest in him. He has a lot of international competition temperament and has proved that at various levels. His constant rise in the international circuit has demonstrated that he is a God-gifted athlete and a raw talent which needs to be polished further if he is to win in the global meets.

Besides the efforts of the athletics governing body in the country (AFP), the man behind his rise is his coach Syed Fayyaz Hussain Bukhari. I have never seen such a sincere personality as a coach. He has a long-standing association with Arshad and eventually has made him a world-beating athlete.

This man should not be forgotten at any stage in future whenever we talk about Arshad’s development programme. The state needs to invest massively in Arshad. He needs to be trained in the top training centres of the world. He can further improve and bring for Pakistan loads of medals from various major international meets in future. The Tokyo Olympics was just the start for him.

Arshad is a great brand and we should take care of him. We should not ignore him if he is unable to claim a medal in Tokyo. He already has put Pakistan directly in the Olympics which is a great achievement. In 2018, he won a bronze medal for Pakistan in the Asian Games. He has now gained enough experience that he can earn major medals.

In my previous article, I covered weightlifter Talha Talib who put in a glorious performance a few days ago, finishing fifth in the Tokyo Olympics 67 kilogramme weightlifting competitions. He missed bronze by just two kilogramme. He also needs to be supported like Arshad.

Our shooters also performed well although they finished well short of the target. This was Pakistan’s best ever show in Olympics shooting history. Gulfam Joseph finished ninth out of 36 shooters in the 10 metre air pistol event. Ghulam Mustafa Bashir finished tenth and Khalil Akhtar ended 15th in the 25metre rapid fire pistol event.

The trio had qualified directly for the Olympics.

Swimmer Bisma Khan also did well by improving her time. She clocked 27.78 seconds in the 50metre freestyle competition, surpassing her previous best time of 27.90 seconds and setting a new national record.

She overall finished at the 56th spot out of 81 swimmers who featured in that event. Her two-year training in Kazan, Russia, seems to have helped her a lot.

The biggest disappointment in Tokyo which Pakistan faced was Najma Parveen’s show. She finished last out of 41 athletes who featured in the 200 metre heats by clocking 28.12 seconds, which really humiliated Pakistan. Her personal best time in this event is 23.69 which she clocked during the 13th South Asian Games in Nepal in 2019 which fetched her a silver medal. The WAPDA athlete had made entry into the Olympics in a controversial way.

The AFP, knowing that she had not trained well for the world’s biggest event, had declined her entry by writing to the World Athletics but the Pakistan Olympic Association (POA) reinstated that. There is no doubt about the ability of Najma. She has been a great performer over the years but she did not deserve to feature in the Tokyo Olympics when she was in such bad shape.

The AFP had established a camp for her before Eid-ul-Fitr at Lahore. She trained there for some time but did not turn up after Eid despite several contacts from AFP which forced it to decline her entry. The problem with us is that we start talking about our sports structure and issues when some major games are in progress.

We talk about Pakistan football when the FIFA World Cup is in progress and these days we are criticising our sports system because Tokyo Games are in progress. We will soon forget these things once these Games are over.

What we need is a system overhaul. There are many issues which need to be resolved. The state will need to take a giant step and put sports on its priority list. That is the only way to develop this sector. If we do this we will then be in a perfect position to address the rest of the issues relating to sports governance.

73.alam@gmail.com