Days After Defeating His Hero on the Way to Clinching Wrestling World Title, Bahraini Athlete’s 2 Year Old Video Cheering for Him Went Viral

The 2023 World Wrestling Championship in Serbia was all set to be another contest between Kyle Snyder and Abdulrashid Sadulayev. However, a young Bahraini wrestler entered his maiden tournament and shattered the two-man competition once and for all. In fact, the 20-year-old sent the legends back home without even making a finals appearance.

Akhmad Tazhudinov conquered the 97kg weight class and became the new World Wrestling Champion. After delivering a shocking surprise at the championships, the youngster has come up with a pleasant surprise for wrestling fans. A two-year-old video has surfaced on social media, where Tazhudinov can be seen cheering for his champion hero: The hero he beat in the semi-finals, Abdulrashid Sadulaev.

Reigning wrestling champion’s adorable moment surfaces online

Akhmad Tazhudinov entered the World Championships at Belgrade. Representing a non-powerhouse nation, entering the world championships for the first time, nobody anticipated the 20-year-old to wreak havoc on the mats. According to NBC Sports, Tazhudinov is also from Dagestan, just like Sadulaev, and trained at an institute named after the Russian champion. The United Wrestling World also broke that Tazhudinov shares a coach with the Tokyo gold medalist. This information pleasantly surprised several wrestling fans. However, this small dose of warmth was quickly overtaken by a recently uploaded video clip on X.

The tweet showed an 18-year-old Tazhudinov watching Sadulaev win the Oslo world title of 2021. The clip later showed Tazhudinov at this year’s championship, where he razed through the competition to claim the gold medal. The video captured the young wrestler sitting with several other students at the training center while watching the match. While everyone knows that Tazhudinov was the challenger who changed the status quo of everything, the way he wrestled made people wonder if things were the other way around.

The absolute domination of Akhmad Tazhudinov

Akhmad Tazhudinov faced the defending world champion, Kyle Snyder, in the quarter-finals. The American freestyler struggled against the 20-year-old and couldn’t manage to earn a single point off his ironclad defense. The match ended with a whopping score of 11-0, after which the Bahraini advanced to the semis to face his hero. 

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Even the role model failed to do much damage to the Bahraini’s defenses, while Tazhudinov kept scoring points. This marked the second time another wrestler could best Sadulaev after Kyle Snyder in a global championship. Unfortunately, Sadulaev got injured following the match and couldn’t play the bronze medal duel against Snyder. The wild card entry of the 20YO has now added another worthy contender for the 2024 Olympics. Will Tazhudinov be able to beat his hero and his biggest rival one more time in Paris?

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