Archery
Indian recurve archers shine in team events at Asian Championships
The Indian men's, women's recurve teams and the compound mixed team will compete for gold medal at the Asian Archery Championships.
Pravin Jadhav (Source: World Archery)
The Indian men's recurve team comprising of Pravin Jadhav, Kapil and Parth Salunkhe and women's recurve team of Ankita Bhakat, Ridhi and Madhu Vedwan have reached their respective gold medal match at the ongoing Asian Archery Championships.
After failing to enter the final four in the individual events, the Indian men stepped up under pressure to win their semifinals against Bangladesh 5-4 in a shoot-off. The match started on a steady note with both India and Bangladesh shooting 53 in the first set of six arrows. The Bangladeshis then took the second set 56-53 to race to a 3-1 lead in the contest. The third set too ended in a stalemate at 56-56 as Bangladesh looked in prime position to enter the final with a 4-2 lead.
With a spot in the final slipping away, Pravin, Kapil and Parth stepped up their game to clinch the fourth and final set 56-55 to force the semifinal into a shoot-off and eventually clinching it, thanks to a bullseye from Tokyo Olympian Pravin Jadhav.
The women's recurve team of Ankita, Ridhi and Madhu, on the other hand, had a rather easy outing as they steamrolled their opponents from Vietnam 6-0 to enter the gold medal match.
Both the Indian men's and women's recurve teams will face South Korea in the final on Thursday.
While the recurve teams reached the final, both the men's and women's compound team will be seen fighting it out for the bronze medal tomorrow.
On one side, the men's compound team of Aman Saini, Abhishek Verma and Rishabh Yadav fell to a hard-fought 229-230 loss to the team from Kazakhstan and on the other, the women's team of Priya Gurjar, Parneet Kaur and Jyothi Surekha Vennam surrendered tamely to Iran with the scores reading 220-227.
In the mixed section, the compound pair of Jyothi Surekha and Rishabh Yadav reached the final with a 156-154 win over Kazakhstan, while the young recurve pair of Ankita Bhakat and Kapil fell to a semifinal loss against Bangladesh in a shoot-off to make their way into the bronze medal match.
