BIRMINGHAM: Shajar Abbas’ personal best fourth-place result in his heat wasn’t good enough.
On Tuesday, the 22-year-old Pakistani sprinter was cruelly eliminated from the men’s 100-meter semifinal event at the Commonwealth Games.
At the Alexander Stadium, Shajar ran in heat eight and finished in 10.38 seconds, trailing Jamaica’s Conroy Jones (10.28), Scotland’s Adam Thomas (10.30), and Trinidad and Tobago’s Eric Harrison Jr. (10.37).
However, due to a peculiarity in the qualifying standards, Shajar was forced to watch Jake Doran of Australia, whom finished 0.01 seconds later than him, go to the semi-finals.
The top two finishers from each of the 10 heats, along with the seven quickest losers, made up the 27-man semi-final lineup, including Doran, who finished among the best two in the second heat.
In other words, Harrison and Buntin Nadale of St. Kitts and Nevis, who both ran in 10.37, advanced to Wednesday’s semifinals ahead of Shajar, who’d been 27th overall among 70 sprinters.
Shajar told reporters, “I couldn’t begin with a nice beginning but I rebounded and had been hoping to go through. “I gave it my best effort, but that’s sport for you,” I was unable to place in the top two, but a sprinter who finished in a slower time than I did advanced since he had placed second in his heat.
