|
 |   |
EVENTS Fantasy Central Inside Game Multimedia Central Statitudes Your Turn Message Boards Email Newsletters Golf Guide Cities Work in Sports
CNNSI.com GROUP
COMMERCE
|  |
Not limited to Koreans Medal distribution pleases taekwando advocatesLatest: Sunday October 08, 2000 05:17 PM
SYDNEY, Australia (CNNSI.com) -- Taekwondo officials went to great lengths to make sure Korea didn't dominant the sport during its Olympic debut. The World Taekwondo Federation did not, however, totally eliminate controversy. To make sure the nation that created taekwondo -- the "way of the hand and foot" -- didn't completely dominate the medals, each country except host Australia was limited to four athletes in the games, where eight golds were contested. As a result, the breadth of the competition was better than most would have thought. Nearly 50 nations, from Austria to Venezuela, entered. Taekwondo has even provided Vietnam with its first ever Olympic medal -- a silver for Tran Hieu Ngan in the women's 57-kilogram class. Even some traditional rivals were impressed.
"I watched two days of taekwondo, and I think it is in many ways superior to karate," said Yushiro Yagi, head of Japan's Olympic delegation. But despite large and very spirited crowds each day, the sport's debut has not been without a few bumps. Like most sports involving judges, the point system has been a problem. Charles Bayou, of the Ivory Coast team, said he was unhappy about the refereeing. He was so upset that during a match involving his player, N'Guessan Sebastien Konan, he even wept. Konan lost to Mexico's Victor Manuel Estrada Garibay, 7-4, in a repechage match for the bronze medal. "I am a little bit disappointed at the results, which were unfair," he said. "I don't know why they did not count correctly." In taekwondo, three judges sit around the square fighting area. When they believe a competitor has scored a valid kick, they press a red or blue button corresponding with the color of the athlete's headgear. The athlete with the most points after three three-minute rounds is the winner. Unless the buttons are pressed virtually simultaneously, the points won't register, however. And there is always room for dispute over what constitutes a valid scoring kick. Halfway through the four-day competition, two unofficial complaints were lodged over point disputes, both in bouts that went in favor of Australians, prompting the World Taekwondo Federation to issue a statement in its own defense. "The WTF has placed a top priority on impartiality in order to present this first-time medal sport in the best possible light," it said. The statement noted that judges found making repeated arbitrary calls can be suspended for up to four years. Questions have also been raised over whether judges have been unnecessarily hard on the Korean entries to avoid a dominance by Korea that would discourage other nations. But, with Korea doing quite well, those claims are hard to support. With just one more athlete still competing, Korea had won two golds and one silver, pretty much as it had expected coming into the games. "I've no big complaint," said South Korean coach Kim Jong-ki. Kim said the one gold that got away, when Sin Jun-sik lost to America's Steve Lopez, was lost in a close, but fair, bout. "The decision could go either way," he said. "Our player has superior techniques, but could not use them because of his opponent's height advantage." Kim acknowledged that the most important thing for Korea at these games is keeping taekwondo's Olympic future alive, not taking home all the golds. "I don't know if there is any subtle effort by referees to check and balance our supremacy in the sport," he said. "But I agree that spreading the golds among a variety of countries would help promote taekwondo worldwide." French team coach Philippe Bouedo wrote off the complaints as mostly just sour grapes. "The refereeing so far has been very good and fair," he said. "When you lose, you are upset. When you win, you are happy." The Associated Press contributed to this report.
|
