Thursday, 22 April 2021 Kianoush Rostami won an Asian Championships gold medal but he could not have looked unhappier on the platform and the podium in Tashkent. Rostami, one of the world’s most popular weightlifters who has won gold and silver at the past two Olympic Games, is clearly still seething about his failure to qualify for Tokyo 2020. The 29-year-old Iranian has the third highest total at 96kg in Olympic qualifying but sits 32 nd in the rankings because he scored zero points in the second phase. For that he blamed a mix-up by officials at the 2019 International Weightlifting Federation World Championships and his own federation for an administrative delay in entering him for a qualifier in Switzerland 18 months ago.