The Swedish wrestler, Ara Abrahamian, threw his bronze medal down and stormed off at the Olympic ceremony for wrestling today. See video here.
The Olympics are about sports and sportsmanship. Abrahamian shamed his country and his sport with his actions. He seems to feel he was cheated out of the gold, but regardless he should be graceful in his loss. I understand that the judges are now under investigation, but he should let that take its course and at least be graceful on the stand. This is not about if he was wronged (which it sounds like he may have been) but about the way you carry yourself when you represent your country.
Rebecca M Ford 
As a journalist you should watch the game and learn the facts before calling him a looser. The judge is a relative to a top member of Fila. The president judge gave Are the point after holding his parterre position, while the swiss/italian judge gave the point to the Italian instead. What pissed Ara off was that they blew the game off before 3rd round without any explaination and refused to follow the rule book and overlook the taped video recording of the game after the Swedish coach filed a protest.
Maybee you should know a little more about the cituation before ju judge. The problem wasn´t the medal but the judges and they are now under investigation. How come Abrahamian got a penalty for having half a hand out side( half the body requierd) and the Italian had his whole body outsid the ring and did not get a penalty. IOK had demanded that FILA have a pressconferense.
I’m from Sweden and I’, not ashamed for what he did. I think it was an excellent way to protest the stupid judgment in the semi final.
He should never have lost the semi final in the way he did. He did nothing wrong in semi final so there were no reason for the penalty he got making him lose.
By the way he is not “THIRD BEST IN THE WORLD”
This is the Olympics and not the world championship.
Sorry Rebecca! But the swedish people stands behind Ara since the decision was all about obvious corruption and bribes, nothing new in the world of wrestling. The Italian wrestler, who should be ashamed for recieving the gold medal, and especially the judges are responsible for this scandal, Ara just showed the world what is going on the so-called games of sportmanship. If he hadn’t they could have gone away with this repeating behaviour once again.
Sweden are a small country and that is why the italian bosses of FILA thought they could get away with this, but a man with such a big heart as Ara won’t bow when they are stealing his dream away, when they are stealing four years of his life away. He knows he’s the best so why should he care about a bronze medal. Let’s hope they take the medal away, as they are threatening to do, to show the world what a bunch of corrupt low-life little creeps they are. Ara couldn’t care less, he’s a hero and not a puppet as most of the others in this ridiculous games are. Personally I think all Swedes should quit the games and leave so the big kahunas can carry on with their charade.
Cheers
Ofcourse he should react. He has been training extreamly hard almost every day for four years trying to get the gold medal(already has a silver) just to have som bribed judge take it all away wrongfully. This was his last chance. There is no next time for him. He must react, and so should everyone when its not fair play. We react when athletes cheat, so we should react when refs cheats. I´m really looking foward to FILAs forced press conference. First they refused but now IOC have forced them to comment and explain themselves.
First of all, it looked to me like Abrahamian merely laid down the medal on the mat, not threw it down like the media have claimed.
That said, I still think the ’72 U.S. men’s basketball team had exactly the right idea in this scenario: simply blow off the medal ceremony altogether. That got their protest across in no uncertain terms without making them look like jerks or spoiling the ceremony for the other medalists. If Abrahamian had done this, he’d be commanding a lot more respect than he does now.
The real losers are the ones that never protest and make corruption flourish.
He was cheated in 2004 as well. Enough is enough…
Wow. Mikael is an idiot. Why the hell should Minguzzi be ashamed of his gold medal? It’s not like he had any say in the decision. The guy has been training just as hard as Abrahamian for the past four years and now your robbing him of what should be one of the greatest moments in his life cause you want to call him a cheater over something the guy had no control over? Real classy. Maybe the Swede’s stand by their athlete but it is apparent that the rest of the world views this as a pathetic act of bad sportsmanship. Here’s what it comes down to.. Minguzzi may have gone out of bounds in two controversial instances of that match and Abrahamian receives no points. Ara then puts a hand and a leg out and is penalized (the rule being half of the body) and loses the match. In my opinion the match was badly officiated and the judges did not do their jobs either of reviewing the match and overturning the verdict. BUT, how should a grown man who is competing in an international event that represents sportsmanship and the love of competition act? He should formally challenge the decision and if it stands, accept his loss with grace. By tossing his medal he spat in the face of all the athletes that would have died to have represented their countries in the olympic games, much less made it to the third place podium. Furthermore, he stole the spot light from the gold and silver medalists in what is meant to be a special moment. I’ve seen he has been called a hero in some blogs… more like a joke.
Rebecca, I remember the US basketball in the 1972 olympics also rejected their silver medal, those medals are still collecting dust in Switzerland. Are you implying they are a bunch of ‘sore losers’?
Italian president of FILA
Italian vice president of FILA (also chairman of the italian wrestling association)
swizz ref judging the game (cousin of the head of fila and of italian ancestry)
Italian wrestler.
Too bad the suggestion by the earlier swedish member of FILA Pelle Svensson that referees be drawn by lottery before each game was refused by FILA (caused him to leave the association).
Abrahamian was robbed of a fair chance and I can’t believe you are commenting about something which you clearly have no knowledge.
The swedish team filed a protest straight after the game, but FILA refused to even watch the tv-footage (REQUIRED when a protest is filed) that proved Abrahamian was right.
The swedish people is behind Ara Abrahamian and the way he acted has brought no shame to us.
Abrahamian (who is from armenia originally) even congratulated the turkish wrestler to his bronze before stepping down from the podium.
http://www.expressen.se/sport/1.1265505/domaren-hanskrattar-at-abrahamian-jag-gjorde-ratt
And I forgot, here is a much better picture for your blog. The ref laughing abrahamian in the face after the match.
This is one of those things that ‘if I have to explain to you, you wouldn’t understand’. If you don’t see whatis wrong with this guy’s behavior, then you got a real problem too. There are always controversial calls in sports. That is not the issue. HIS conduct and attitude is the problem. Sports at all levels is getting worse about this. But apparently the Swedish people don’t care. And the Armenians are playing the race card as well as defending their ‘champ’. Oh, by the way, I am an American and I think the same of the 1972 American Basketball team for their immature conduct.
Well, I think Jason is an idiot. First he clearly don´t know anything about the situation. Ara tried to and second, the international court CAS said that Abrahamian was right and FILA MUST change and work towards fair play. Everything Abrahamian said CAS agreed on. Abrahamian tried to “formally challenge the decision” and the ref just laughed in his face.
So if the rest of the world views this as a pathetic act of bad sportsmanship, I think they should really think again and probably be ashamed.