DOHA, 7 December 2005 — Kuwait shifted Syria from the top of the medal table, claiming six gold medals on the sixth day of the Third West Asian Games yestersday.
Kuwait, who were overnight on 12 gold medals as against Syria’s 17, set the shooting range alight by pocketing four titles and then bagged two more in diving to take their gold tally to 18.
Syria also won a gold in shooting to take their tally to 18 but they have fewer silver medals than Kuwait and thus occupy the second place in the overall standings, while Iran are in third position with 11 golds.
The Kuwaitis had a memorable day at the state-of-the-art Dhuhail Shooting Complex built for next year’s Asian Games as their marksmen won the individual and team golds in the skeet and then claimed the10m air rifle individual and team titles.
Kuwait’s star of the day was 1998 world champion Abdulla al-Rashid who won the skeet contest after a shoot-off with the UAE’s Saeed al-Maktoum by just two points after both were tied on 147.
Kuwait, however, were comprehensive winners in the team event as al-Rashid, Habib Saud and Zaid al-Mutairi shot 357, beating the UAE who had 337. Syria were third, having fired 331. Two more golds came Kuwait’s way with Khalid al-Subaie winning the individual 10m air rifle competition and then helping his team to victory in the team event.
Syria’s only gold of the day came from Mohammed Sain in the 25m individual center pistol event while Qatar claimed the team title.
In diving the Kuwaiti duo of Budour al-Ruwaished and Huseen al-Qallaf were comfortable winners in the 3m synchronized springboard event with Iran and Qatar taking the silver and bronze respectively.
Al-Qallaf then dominated the competition to win the 3m individual springboard title to round off an excellent day for Kuwait.
Meanwhile, there was heart-break for Qatar in the football competition when they were edged out by Saudi Arabia in a “lucky draw” to decide the fourth semifinalists.
The situation arose after Bahrain and Oman played out a 2-2 draw yesterday which resulted in both teams bowing out of the tournament.
Qatar and Saudi Arabia were tied on points as well as on goal difference forcing a draw of lots in which Saudi Arabia were picked as the lucky semifinalists.
However, it came as little comfort for Saudi Arabia who find themselves facing Iraq in semifinals. Iraq had won their preliminary group clash 5-1. The other semifinal will be played between Iran and Syria.
