MUSCAT: International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach has appointed International Hockey Federation (FIH) president Tayyab Ikram as a member of the Olympic Solidarity Commission recently.
“I’m delighted to be part of the International Olympic Committee's efforts to ensure the welfare of athletes. The Olympic Solidarity Commission will help the athletes get the best training opportunities to perform and excel at the top level,” Ikram told Oman Observer from Salalah, where he was present to attend the ongoing Men’s and Women’s Hockey5s Asia Cup.
“This is a great initiative from the IOC to ensure good conditions for the athletes to participate in world-wide sports events and thereby developing the sports across the world. I’m happy to be part of it and will work towards its goals,” Ikram said.
The aim of Olympic Solidarity is to provide assistance to all the National Olympic Committees (NOCs) for athlete development programmes, in particular those with the greatest needs of it. This assistance is achieved through multi-faceted programmes prioritising athlete development, training of coaches and sports administrators and promoting the Olympic values.
GREAT EVENT
The FIH chief said the Hockey5s Men’s and Women’s Asia Cup has been organised very professionally.
“The Hockey5s Asia Cup is a great opportunity for the Oman Hockey Association (OHA) to showcase their organising abilities ahead of Hockey5s World Cup in Muscat next year. This is also the qualifiers for the World Cup and offers good competition for the Asian hockey nations.
“The technical level of hockey among the Asian countries is getting closer and it was good to see some great matches during the tournament. The hockey5s format has given opportunities for the second and third tier hockey nations to catch up with the top-tier nations. That is the most exciting thing about this new format,” the official from Macau said.
The FIH president appreciated the OHA’s good work of making the Asia Cup a great event in Salalah.
“The OHA has done a great job in Salalah and hopefully they can repeat the same in Muscat for the World Cup as well,” Ikram signed off.
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