Asian Archery Continental Qualifier: Dhiraj Bommadevara wins Paris Olympics quota place

Dhiraj Bommadevara lost the gold medal match but secured India's first 2024 Paris Olympics quota place in archery at the Archery Continental Qualification Tournament (CQT) in Bangkok on Saturday.

In the semifinal, Dhiraj won 6-0 against Iran's Mohammadhossein Golshani Asl in the semifinals to confirm the quota place.

Dhiraj did not drop any set as he won 12 sets on a trot to reach the final.

He started the day with a conformable 6-0 win against another Iranian Sadegh Ashrafi in the quarterfinal with three back-to-back scores of 28. In the semifinal, he improved his scoring and shot seven tens out of 9 arrows.

In the final, he was up against another quota place winner Lin Zih-Siang of Chinese Taipei for the title. Dhiraj continued his good form in the final and won the first set 28-27 to take an early lead of 2-0. Dheeraj dropped his first point of the tournament when he lost the second set 27-29 and drew the third set to tie the match 3-3.

He quickly recovered in the fourth set with a perfect 30 to take a 5-3 lead, but Lin forced the shoot-off with a low-scoring 26-25 win in the final end. Dhiraj scored a 9 in comparison to Lin's 10 in the shoot-off to be satisfied with the silver medal.

Another Indian archer, Tarundeep Rai lost 0-6 to Lin Zih-Siang of Chinese Taipei in the quarterfinal and missed his shot on the medal.