June 12, (THEWILL)- Weightlifting athletes from around the world going to the Olympics in Tokyo, Japan, have seen their medal chances change dramatically after leading Chinese female athlete and Rio 2016 gold medallist, Deng Wei and world clean and jerk record-holder, Tian Tao, were left out of the Tokyo 2020 delegation.
The Chinese team of eight left out Tao due to an elbow injury that has affected the Games’ involvement of the athlete who tops the weightlifting rankings and holds the world record in the men’s 96 kilograms category.
In a statement revealing the exclusion, the Chinese Weightlifting Association said: “The internal selection of lifters within China to the Tokyo Olympic Games started in 2019.
“Unfortunately, Tian Tao, world champion and clean and jerk world record holder, and Deng Wei, Olympic champion and world record holder, were not among the eight, due to their injuries.”
Deng Wei, on the other hand, who holds three world records and won at 63kg at Rio 2016, would have been one of the strongest gold medal favourites at Tokyo 2020 for the Chinese to continue the Asian country’s dominance in the competition, but is unavailable to compete.
THEWILL recalls that China has won five weightlifting gold medals at every Olympic Games this century. Most often weightlifters from other nations come to weightlifting to attempt to displace the Chinese, or if possible, completely avoid weight categories with Chinese lifters, for their chances at medals.
Yet, in the absence of these two, Wei and Tao, the formidable China team to represent the country in Tokyo, of four men and four women, collectively hold 15 world records, as well as two Olympic titles and will not be easy to displace except by the most excellent of the best.
Ahead the commencement of the Games, the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) has the responsibility to publish the final ranking lists for all weight categories for Tokyo 2020, after team selections had been made worldwide.
The standard practice will see the top eight in each category qualify to compete in the Games together with the highest placed athletes from the five Continental Federations of the world. There will also be a member of the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) all-sport refugee team, Cyrille Tchatchet, now residing in England after leaving Cameroon, competing in the 96 kg category.
For the XXXLL Olympiad, there will be additional home nation places for Japan, and tripartite invitations are to be decided by the IWF as well.
The Games in Tokyo will have a total of 16 nations restricted to one male and one female, or two males and two females due to multiple doping violations. For extreme doping violations, three countries have been banned outrightly. They include Thailand, Egypt and Malaysia.
Ongoing cases of other doping infringements could result in more bans of varying degrees as Romania, Vietnam and Colombia are all under investigation for performance enhancing drugs use by their athletes.
Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
