21 countries confirms participation in Asian Wrestling

New Delhi: Top grapplers from 21 countries have confirmed participation in the Senior Asian Wrestling Championships, a 2010 Commonwealth Games Test event, to be held from May 12 to 16 at the Indira Gandhi Sports Complex.

Olympic bronze medallist Sushil Kumar will lead the Indian charge while the other star attractions of the five-day event are defending champion Iranian Lashgari Ehsan (84kg) and Beijing Olympics silver medallist Yusup Abdusalomov (84kg) of Tajikistan. The tournament will be held under three categories -- Free Style, Greco Roman and Female. A total of 257 grapplers will take part in the event from countries, including China, Korea, Iran, Japan, Mongolia, Kazakhastan, Pakistan, Singapore and Uzbekistan. Besides Sushil (66kg), the Indian contenders include Ramesh Kumar (74kg), Anuj Kumar (84kg), Joginder Singh (55kg), Anil Kumar (96kg), Dharmender Dalal (120kg) and Alka Tomar (59kg, woman). Also participating are Beijing Olympic bronze medalist Mutalimov Marid (120kg) of Kazakhstan, Asian bronze medalist woman Orchirbat Burmaa (72kg) of Mongolia and last year`s World Championship silver medallist Han Kum OK (51kg) of Korea.Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) President GS Mander exuded confidence that Indian grapplers will shine in the event. "This is a big tournament. We are leaving no stone unturned to make it successful. I hope that the Indians will put up good performance in the event. We are participating in all the categories," Mander said at a press conference."Wrestling is very strong in Asia and a very high level of competition is expected. Commonwealth Games are coming and then the Asian Games are the other big targets ahead of us," Mander added. Wrestling world body FILA president Raphael Martinetti along with a large number of FILA officials will supervise the event, organisers said. PTI