Gymnastics
2019 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships: Sans Dipa Karmakar, India have task cut out in Germany
Team India will have their task cut out as they begin their campaign at the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships on Friday at Stuttgart in Germany. Sans injured Dipa Karmakar, the six-member Indian team will be aiming to book a spot in the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, with the event offering individual Olympic berths to the top 12 male and the top 20 female gymnasts in the all-around competitions.
The top three gymnasts in each apparatus final will also seal their Olympic tickets. The top nine teams in each category (excluding the three sides that have already qualified after sealing their spots last year) will also progress to Tokyo.
Dipa, the only Indian to have qualified for the Olympics, is out of the edition with a lingering knee injury, and in her absence, the onus will be on Pranati Das, Pranati Nayak and Aruna Reddy to rise to the occasion.
While Nayak won a bronze in the vault event at the Senior Asian Artistic Gymnastics Championships held earlier this year in Mongolia, Aruna bagged a bronze in the World Cup last year.
Also read: All hope isn’t lost for Dipa Karmakar says coach amid row over gymnastics trial
In the men's category, all hopes will be pinned on Ashish Kumar, 2010 Asian Games bronze medalist. The team also comprises of Aditya Singh Rana and Yogeshwar Singh.
29-year old Ashish, who failed to put up a good showing in the Commonwealth Games last year, put up another dismal performance in the World Cup in May 2018 and did not qualify for the Asian Championships. However, he topped in the selection trials last month after a training stint in Poland, finishing the trials with 78.7 points.
Aruna, on the other hand, made the cut with a score of 49.05 points, with Nayak emerging as the top-scorer in the women's category with 50.75 points. Pranati Das finished with 49.1 points. In the men's category, Yogeshwar had 77.6 points in the trials, and Rana finished third with 77.5.
With Ashish, Nayak and Aruna in consistent form over the last few months, they can be expected to qualify for the finals, but a top-three finish looks unlikely.
India's best-ever result in the World Championships came way back in 2015, when Dipa finished in fifth place in the vault event. Since then, India has failed to leave a significant mark in the Championships.
The Indians, thus, will need to play out of their skins as they aim for a good outing in Germany.