Ilima Guseynova, a tennis player from Turkmenistan, won a silver medal at the final tournament of the Asian Championship among players under 14 that ended in the Indian city of Bhubaneswar. The 13-year-old pupil of the «Ashgabat» tennis academy achieved this success in doubles with the Uzbek tennis player Emily Kim as part of the Central and Western Asian team, in which both athletes were selected based on the results of the regional qualifying tournament in Bahrain held in January this year.
The final stage of the Asian Championship brought together more than 60 athletes from 18 countries who competed in both singles and doubles.
12 duets competed for medals in women's doubles.
In their first match at the 1/4 final stage, Ilima Guseynova and Emily Kim defeated a pair from Sri Lanka - 6:3, 6:1, then in the semifinals they defeated the international duet Htay Htay Myint (Myanmar) / Yang Rong Tseng ( Taiwan) - 6:3, 7:5, and only in the final lost to Yeva Koryshyeva and Yerkejan Janatayeva from Kazakhstan - 1:6, 2:6, eventually content with silver medals.
Earlier this year, Ilima won silver and bronze medals in the Central and West Asia Under 14 Qualifiers in Bahrain, and bronze in the Asia/Oceania Juniors (U-14) World Qualifiers in Sri Lanka. And now she has achieved historical success, becoming the first medalist in the final tournament of the Asian Tennis Championship in Turkmenistan. To date, she is also one of the contenders for a competitive European tour later this year.
It is noteworthy that this significant event coincided with the 31st anniversary of the registration on the 14th of April in 1992 of the Tennis Federation of Turkmenistan. To date, this public sports organization unites more than 1,500 tennis players, 40 certified coaches, 30 of which have an ITF international coaching certificate. By the way, one of them is the head coach of the national team of Turkmenistan and the tennis academy «Ashgabat» Mirali Gasanov, under whose leadership Ilima Guseynova improves her sportsmanship, according to the decision of the International Tennis Federation, he led the national team of Central and West Asia as a captain in the final stage of the continental championship in India.
