Know Your Rivals: Who will be a threat for Indian wrestlers at Paris 2024

Indian wrestlers have a very rich history at the Olympic Games. This sport has provided seven medals to the country, which is the second best among all the sports of the Olympics.

India has won at least one wrestling medal from the previous four editions of the Olympics. This included India's best wrestling performance at the last Olympics in Tokyo.

However, things aren't going that well in this sport since the Tokyo heroics especially in the men's department as both medallists from the last edition are missing in Paris because of injury and form concerns.

India has six wrestlers in Paris but has only one male wrestler, Aman Sehrawat, on the team. On the other hand, this is the first time India will have five female wrestlers in a single edition of the Olympics.

The Bridge looks at the opponents of all six Indian wrestlers who will pose a threat to them:

Aman Sehrawat - Men's 57 Kg

India's lone male representative, Aman Sehrawat, is the most consistent Indian wrestler in the last three years. The former Asian Champion and Asian Games medalist is one of two seeded wrestlers from India at the Paris Olympics.

However, he is not amongst the medal favorites but still has an outside chance of winning a bronze medal, if gets past his probable quarterfinal opponent Arsen Harutyunyan of Armenia.

If Aman reached the semifinals, he will most probably take on the former Olympic medalist, Rei Higuchi of Japan. Rei has recently taken a dominating win over Aman and will be a favorite in this matchup.

Photo Credits: - Rambo/X

Antim Panghal - Women's 53 Kg

Antim is India's lone world medalist from the recent edition of the 2023 Zagreb World Championships. She is also the favorite medal contender for India in this Paris Olympics.

She is fourth seeded wrestler and hence avoided two of the medal favorites, Akari Fujinami of Japan and Jonna Malmgren of Sweden in her half. This also increases the chances of reaching the finals.

Her probable semifinal matchup will be Lucía Yépez of Ecuador and Antim will be the favorite to win this matchup and might become India's first female finalist in this sport at Olympics.

Photo Credits: - Rambo/X

Vinesh Phogat - Women's 50 Kg

Vinesh is the most experienced Indian wrestler at this Olympics, heading to her third Olympic Games. But, this time, she is not among the medal favorites especially because she entered the tournament as an unseeded wrestler.

This means she can get a very tough draw ahead of her. However, she will be aiming to break her Olympic medal drought at this Olympics.

For that to happen, she must be hoping to get into the upper half of the draw which has the clear gold medal favorite Yui Susaki of Japan, which improved her probability of making it to the repechages.

Photo Credits: - Rambo/X

Reetika Hooda - Women's 76 Kg

Reetika is the first Indian wrestler to become a world U23 champion and could be the real dark host for India at the Paris Olympics. She has shown a good improvement on the circuit within the last year.

This is the most open weight category among all the six women's wrestling categories as there is not any clear favourite to win the medal. However, she is the unseeded wrestler which might made her route a bit tougher.

Aiperi Medet Kyzy of Kyrgyzstan is the most renowned wrestler in this category and might be the toughest opponent for Reetika. Aiperi is a two-time world medalist and also a time Asian champion.

The rest of three medals will have a good competition from 5-6 wrestlers. Japan, Cuba, Colombia, the USA, China, and Reetika all have a good chance of claiming a medal from the Olympics.

Photo Credits: - Rambo/X

Anshu Malik - Women's 57 Kg

Anshu Malik has always came under the most talented Indian wrestlers but had a long history of injury. She came into the limelight after her world championships silver medal in 2021.

Heading to her second Olympics, Anshu is highly dependent on the draw for a medal opportunity as two of the favorites Tsugumi Sakurai and Helen Maroulis are in the same top half of the draw,

Anshu will be hoping to get a bottom half of the draw as she is an unseeded wrestler. However, it's a tricky task for her to manage any medal from the Paris Olympics.

Anshu had a great victory over Anastasia Nichita of Moldova this year which will increase her confidence at the games and might put up a surprise next month.

Photo Credits: - Rambo/X

Nisha Dahiya - Women's 68 Kg

Nisha Dahiya is one of the rising stars from India but had a very inconsistent run in the last year. She is also playing in a category that has a lot of competition for the top spot.

Nonoka Ozaki of Japan and Amit Elor of the USA will be in a two-way battle for the title in this category. However, they will face tough challenges from Turkish, Chinese, and North Korean wrestlers.

Nisha might be not among the favorites to medal but might pull off one or two surprises at this event where she is among all the unseeded wrestlers.

Photo Credits: - Rambo/X

Medal Predictions

Medal Favorites - Antim Panghal

Dark horse - Reetika Hooda

Outside Chances - Aman Sehrawat, Anshu Malik

Unlikely to medal - Vinesh Phogat, Nisha Dahiya