merlinsbeard

http://www.olimpiyatkomitesi.org.tr/Olimpiyat-Oyunlari-Detay/126/1 Turkish crew. We have 55 athletes, 26 of them men, 29 of them women.

Okey you do not have to get mad this easily I thought you might have meant Turkey and Azerbaijan bribe the referees to get a medal so I wanted to make sure that I understand correctly.

What do you mean by shopping? Could you clarify please?

I do not know why you are talking this way neither this is the place. But if you check the last tournaments you will see these wrestlers are not in the national team. I am not supporting the case if they were. But please think about the possibility that Selim Yaşar did not compete for Turkey but any other country. The situation would probably be the same. The solution is to bring some limitations. Not shout against a whole nation because they have one or two naturalized wrestlers in maybe 15-20 wrestler in a competition.

They are not competing in the international championships. We have better wrestlers in the national team. To my knowledge, we did not have any naturalized wrestler in European Championships this year other than Elif Jale Yeşilırmak who is 33.

Well, at first I did not want to say anything because you are right in some parts but I still think your message is quite biased and has incorrect information. Some Turkish olympians committed doping and some failed the drug test. But the number is definitely not hundreds. It is not even close to that. Besides, there were no legit proof that it is country-organized. Only in two sports, Weightlifting and athletics there were athletes who failed the drug test and in many other sports such as Taekwondo, Wrestling we did not see any in the first level. The doping cases also happened almost 5 years ago and for the last 5 years we have very few doping problem. Of course even one athlete with doping is a shame to country and to the olympics, believe me I am so sorry about the doping scandals in especially athletics but in Turkey the award for winning a medal is really incredible financial-wise. So many dishonest athletes try to get one with doping and hope to take the awards and just quit sports. I hope that with strict regulations now, we have a better future. Again, I am so sorry and I apologize on behalf of Turkish people from all sports and olympicfans for the drug cases before. About the naturalized athletes: Currently we are hopeful about winning one or more medal in wrestling, karate, weightlifting, taekwondo, athletics, modern pentathlon, archery, women boxing and judo. Only in judo and athletics we have naturalized athletes in the medal-winning level. I am not happy about the situation in our athletics but you have some information wrong. Elvan Abeylegesse was 17 years old when she came to Turkey and it was 20 years ago. Her becoming Turkish has nothing to do with the drug cases. Most of other athletes were 20 or 21 years old when they came to Turkey without any success in their hand. Our Turkish athletics committee do not buy anyone. They are people and buying somebody is a very rude choice of word. In fact, athletics committee do not have much to do with these athletes at first. We have athletics club called ENKA and Fenerbahce, they are quite successful in the club league and they always transfer successful and promising athletes all around the world. After some time, I do not know why but some of these athletes become Turkish and start running for Turkey. Now, I am not defending this situation. However, calling this buying somebody is not proper. Almost all of these athletes have not succeded much before they came to Turkey which means they needed better environment, better opportunities. You cannot blame them for trying to have a better life and better career. What I believe is that, international committee should bring some limitations to this. I am not (almost all Turkish citizens are also not) happy about having so many naturalized athletes in athletics. However, just because we have some naturalized athletes who won bronze or silver or maybe gold does not mean we buy them, We have hundreds of very successfull and promising athlete in many sports who were born in Turkey, raised in Turkey. I can give you tens of names who can win a medal in next olympics.

What makes you think that there is cheating in boxing? Not that I claim there is not, I am just ignorant about the issue and wondering.

For Turkey: Wrestling: 2 golds, 1 silver, 2 bronze Taekwondo: 1 gold, 1 bronze Karate: 1 silver, 1 bronze Athletics: 2 bronze In total: 3 golds, 2 silvers, 6 bronze

Başar (Turkey) has won the gold in 85 kg. I was not expecting him to win but I am not too hapy about this gold since grekoroman is still very boring and uncertain when you think about the rules. You can win the gold without a play which does not make any sense to me. Wrestling (especially the traditional Turkish Wrestling) is all about making plays and taking the competitor down. Clearly, this has not been happening in greko for a long time.

thank you for the warm welcome

Oh what a final for Zeliha Ağrıs, she is just 19 and a world champion now. Despite of the disaster we have seen with Servet Tazegül, Turkey has 2 golds now and in 62 kg 1st ranked İrem Yaman will be competing. We might even have 3 golds after all.