Nitesh Siwach wins India’s first Greco-Roman silver since 1962 at Asian Games

Nitesh Siwach missed out on a historic gold but secured India's first silver medal in Greco-Roman wrestling at the Asian Games since 1962, while Mansi Ahlawat lost the bronze medal play-off in women's 62kg event here on Thursday.

Nitesh, who had the opportunity to become India's first Greco-Roman gold medallist at the Asian Games since 1962, went down 0-4 to Japan's home favourite Yuri Nakazato in the men's 97kg final.

Mansi, meanwhile, was beaten 2-5 by Mongolia's Altjin Togtokh, whose strong defence stood out in the medal bout.

Nitesh's medal is India's first silver in Greco-Roman wrestling at the Asian Games since 1962 in Jakarta where Malwa Singh (52kg) and Ganpat Andalkar (+97kg) won gold while Udey Chand (70kg), Sajjan Songh (87kg) and Maruti Mane (97kg) won silver medals.

In that edition, the same wrestlers had also competed in men's freestyle also and won medals on both styles.

Nitesh needed to be aggressive

In the 97kg final, Nitesh tried to establish a two-on-one grip from the opening seconds but Nakazato refused to allow the Indian any attacking opportunity.

The Japanese wrestler opened the scoring by pushing Nitesh out and then forced him into ground position for passivity.

The Indian defended stoutly, denying Nakazato a firm grip for a gut wrench, but the Japanese ended the first period with a 2-0 advantage and kept Nitesh in a headlock position towards the end.

Nakazato then disbalanced Nitesh with a push before converting it into a takedown to stretch his lead to 4-0.

With a minute remaining, Nitesh needed to attack but Nakazato's disciplined defence gave the Indian little room to launch a scoring move.

Nitesh had entered the competition directly in the quarterfinals and defeated Turkmenistan's Amanberdi Agamammedov 7-1 before demolishing Mongolia's Gankhuyang Ganbaatar 9-0 by technical superiority in the first three-minute period of the semifinal.

Mansi, meanwhile, came agonisingly close to winning bronze after fighting back from an early deficit against Altjin.

The aggressive Mongolian pushed Mansi out twice to take a 2-0 lead and then defended a double-leg attack from the Indian. Mansi found another opening for a leg attack but Altjin again managed to thwart her effort.

Altjin was subsequently put on the clock for passivity and Mansi got on the scoreboard, leaving her needing just one successful scoring move to snatch the bronze.

The Indian launched a tremendous leg attack but Altjin summoned all her strength to survive the attempt. Mansi managed a push-out to reduce the deficit, only for Altjin to produce a takedown and snatch the bronze.

Mansi had earlier defeated Kyrgyzstan's Irina Kuznetsova 6-1 before losing 0-6 to Japan's Asian champion Nonoka Ozaki in the semifinals.

Sumit (60kg) and Aman Baroniya (77kg) had already been eliminated from the medal race after losing their respective quarterfinals.

Aman began with an 8-6 comeback win over Mongolia's Borgil Tuvshinbaatar but was stopped by Qatar's Shahin Badaghimofrad, while Sumit lost 1-1 on criteria to Iran's Sajjad Abbasporragani.

Shahin's subsequent defeat in the semifinal also closed the repechage route for Aman.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by The Bridge Desk. It is published from a syndicated feed)