Cyprus Olympic Committee announced its Team for Minsk 2019, during a press conference on Friday 14 June. The Eastern Mediterranean island-country will compete with 39 athletes in 9 sports from 21-30 June in the Belarusian capital.
22 Men and 17 Women will represent Cyprus, with athletics being the sport with the highest number of athletes (20 people). The Team will also see 6 people competing in shooting, 4 in road cycling, 3 in archery, 2 in judo and one athlete each in artistic gymnastics, badminton, boxing and sambo.
Trap shooter Andreas Makris will be the flag bearer at the Opening Ceremony in the Dinamo Stadium on 21 June. Makris recently won the gold medal at the ISSF World Cup in Korea, making him the third Cypriot athlete qualifying so far for Tokyo 2020.
NOC president Dinos Michaelides will lead Team Cyprus NOC and Board Member Kalli Hadjiiosif will serve as Chef de Mission.
“At this such high-level of competitions, our goal is to be competitive first,” NOC Director General Olga Piperidou said during the press conference. “Then in some sports, such as shooting and gymnastics, we aim at winning medals and also getting some Olympic quotas”.
In Baku 2015, Cyprus won one silver medal in skeet shooting mixed double with George Achilleos and Andri Eleftheriou.
Besides Andreas Makris who will make his Olympic debut in Tokyo next year, seven athletes competing in Minsk have already Olympic experience:
* Marios Georgiou, gymnastics, 2018 European bronze medalist
* Andri Christoforou, cycling
* George Achilleos, skeet shooter, four-time Olympian, 5th in Beijing
* Andri Eleftheriou, skeet shooter, two-time Olympian, 7th in Beijing
* Panagiota Andreou, skeet shooter
* Demetris Chondrokoukis, athletics, 12th in Rio in high jump
* Ramona Papaioannou, sprinter, athletics
