Azerbaijan’s Deputy Prime Minister, Chairman of the Cabinet of Ministers’ Road Safety Commission and President of the Azerbaijan Table Tennis Federation (ATTF), Shahin Mustafayev, has once again been re-elected as head of the federation. He has led the ATTF since 2014.
More than a decade at the helm of a single federation is no small amount of time. It is therefore natural to ask how successful this period has been in terms of sporting results and what can be expected from the new four-year cycle.
The ATTF joined the International Table Tennis Federation and the European Table Tennis Union almost immediately after its establishment, in 1995. However, over the following decades, Azerbaijan was still unable to develop athletes whose achievements could match those of such legends of Soviet table tennis as nine-time European champion Valentina Popova and USSR champion Mais Sheydabayov.
Before Shahin Mustafayev took over, one of the notable achievements of Azerbaijani table tennis was the emergence, in 2010, of four international-class referees — Konul Mikayilova, Zaur Mikayilov, Farhad Ismayilov and Alexander Zudov. At the same time, the country lacked athletes of a comparable international level for a long time.
During Mustafayev’s tenure, the federation also placed considerable emphasis on recruiting foreign players. The most successful period came in 2017–2018, when Chinese-born player Ning Jing, representing Azerbaijan, won gold at the European Youth Championships in Guimarães and silver at the 4th Islamic Solidarity Games. A year later, she won the European Youth Championships again in Cluj-Napoca and became champion in the team event. During the same period, Miao Wang also represented Azerbaijan and won a bronze medal at the Islamic Solidarity Games.
After the foreign players ended their careers with Azerbaijan, the national team’s results declined noticeably. However, in 2021, the federation shifted its focus towards developing homegrown talent and gradually moving away from recruiting foreign athletes. It cannot be said that this approach produced immediate results. Azerbaijani players are still largely absent from the top of the world rankings. At the same time, recent years have shown that work with young athletes is beginning to bear its first noticeable fruit.
In particular, the women’s national team won bronze medals at the 6th Islamic Solidarity Games in 2025. The team consisted of Adil Ahmadzada, Marziya Nurmetova, Zemfira Mikayilova (the daughter of Konul and Zaur Mikayilov) and Aylin Asgarova.
An even more notable achievement came from Onur Guluzade. In July this year, the 15-year-old Azerbaijani player, partnering with Turkish player Görkem Öcal, reached the semi-finals of the European Youth Championships and won a bronze medal. Guluzade has also won the Azerbaijani senior national championship two years in a row.
This achievement was historic: Guluzade became the first Azerbaijani athlete to win a medal at the European Youth Championships since the country gained independence. The federation’s key task now is to ensure the conditions for the continued development of one of the country’s most promising young players and to prevent the loss of this generation of talented athletes.
It is also worth noting efforts to popularise table tennis in Azerbaijan. In April this year, Nihad Mammadov set a new world record by successfully returning a shot from a distance of 18.20 metres, surpassing the previous record of 17.50 metres.
Thus, during Shahin Mustafayev’s tenure, the federation has achieved notable results. The new term creates opportunities for the further development of table tennis and the training of athletes capable of successfully representing Azerbaijan on the international stage.
By Vugar Vugarli, exclusively for Caliber.Az
