China's Olympic champion judoka to miss Athens Games

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Thursday, January 01, 2004

China's Olympic champion judoka to miss Athens Games

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Chinese judoka Yuan Hua, who won the over-78kg category in the Sydney Olympic Games, has been left out of the Chinese squad for the Athens Olympics, Chinese sports newspaper China Sports Daily reported on Wednesday.

The Beijing-based newspaper quoted Zhuang Xiaoyan, an official in the Liaoning Sports Technical Institute, where Yuan has been training, that Yuan will have to miss the Athens Games because of injuries and "poor form."

Zhuang, who became the first Chinese Olympic judo champion in the 1992 Barcelona Games, said: "This is a very difficult decisionfor us. It's every athlete's dream to compete in the Olympic Games, but we have no choice. According to the rules, every country can only send one athlete in each category."

Zhuang said Sun Fuming, who won the over-78 category in the Atlanta Olympic Games, will take Yuan's place in Athens.

Sun has maintained a good form in the past few years, winning in the 2002 Asian Games in Busan, South Korea and the national title in 2000.

But Yuan has never recovered from a recurrence of a back problem after the ninth National Games in 2001, the newspaper said.

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