In the pre-Olympic year, the activities of all countries’ national federations of wrestling are aimed at the main inspection of the year, the world championship to be held in September in Las Vegas, where parallel to medals, there will be a lottery for winning an Olympic berth to the 2016 Summer Olympic Games. The Head Coach of the Armenian Greco-Roman style wrestling team Levon Julfalakyan, at the request of Aravot.am, regularly presents the performed and planned works.
– As always, won’t you now tell also in advance how many places do we pretend to the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro?
– I will not break the tradition. As always, the competition will show. I will only say that all candidates of the team are trained with all seriousness and sense of responsibility, and we will try to win the great part of expected places to the world championship.
– A question that all of us are very interested. Eventually, will our wrestlers participate in the Baku upcoming European games?
Read also
– The Federation has already made a decision that the wrestlers will not leave for Baku. This will be officially announced soon. The Federation will sent an official letter to the International Federation noting that we do not consider our participation in European games appropriate. The reasons are numerous and all of them are substantiated. Firstly, these games would not give anything to us in terms of sports, and secondly, no matter how much Azerbaijan gives promises, we know them better. Our wrestling team has already been there and, as they say, our suffering is based on the experience. They just make promises, but do not prove anything in practice. So, we do not have guys to experiment the life security.
– And if our country’s highest and sporting leadership decides that you should attend …?
– In that case, the Federation will once again refer to the problem. But no one, not even the parents, can force his son athlete to go and take part in the competitions in a country in war. Every athlete has the right to self-determination.
Ashot HAKOBYAN
