Four Australians earn Rio taekwondo berths

Carmen Marton, Caroline Marton, Safwan Khalil and Hayder Shkara will represent Australia in taekwondo at this year's Rio Olympics.

All four of Australia's Olympic taekwondo hopefuls are Rio-bound after each won gold at the Oceania qualification tournament in Port Moresby.

Husband and wife Safwan Khalil (less than 58kg) and Carmen Marton (less than 67kg), her older sister Caroline Marton (less than 57kg), and Hayder Shkara (less than 80kg) took out their respective divisions in Papua New Guinea's capital on Saturday.

A shot at redemption in Rio will come as sweet relief to London Olympians Carmen Marton and Khalil.

Marton, 29, narrowly missed out on a medal at the 2012 Games, going on to become Australia's first-ever taekwondo world champion the following year.

Khalil, also 29, lost his tense bronze-medal playoff, too.

For Caroline Marton, this represents her first Olympics nod, having missed the cut for Beijing 2008.

Sports Taekwondo Australia were allowed to select only two male and two female athletes for the event, which was the last available pathway to Brazil.

No Australians managed to book a spot via the World Taekwondo Federation rankings at major events such as the world championships and Grand Prix series.

In Rio, 128 athletes will contest the taekwondo event.


Share

2 min read

Published

Updated

Source: AAP



Share this with family and friends


Get SBS News daily and direct to your Inbox

Sign up now for the latest news from Australia and around the world direct to your inbox.

By subscribing, you agree to SBS’s terms of service and privacy policy including receiving email updates from SBS.

Download our apps
SBS News
SBS Audio
SBS On Demand

Listen to our podcasts
An overview of the day's top stories from SBS News
Interviews and feature reports from SBS News
Your daily ten minute finance and business news wrap with SBS Finance Editor Ricardo Gonçalves.
A daily five minute news wrap for English learners and people with disability
Get the latest with our News podcasts on your favourite podcast apps.

Watch on SBS
SBS World News

SBS World News

Take a global view with Australia's most comprehensive world news service
Watch the latest news videos from Australia and across the world