Wrestling Olympic qualifiers: Sunil Kumar remains in quota race in Greco Roman

Indian Greco-Roman wrestlers faltered with just Sunil Kumar remaining in the race for the Paris Olympic quota at the World Olympic Games qualifier in Turkey on Thursday.

Sunil Kumar will have his chance through a repechage of 87 kg after the wrestler he lost reached the final of the tournament. He will face Ilias Pagkalidis of Greece in the repechage bout.

If he wins, he will fight in the Bronze medal bout and the winner will play a play-off for Paris Olympics qualification.

Earlier in the pre-quarters, Sunil almost defeated Azerbaijan's Rafig Huseynov. Sunil was leading 3-1 till the last minute of the bout but conceded a step-out.

With time running out, Rafig got in on a body lock and forced Kumar over the edge for a step-out. But the Indian was assessed a one-point penalty for fleeing, giving Rafig a 3-3 win on criteria. An unsuccessful challenge added the final point.

Apart from Sunil, Sumit (60kg), Ashu (67kg), Vikas (77kg), Nitesh (97kg) and Naveen (130kg) lost their bouts, with the focus now shifting to freestyle.

Sumit lost his 60kg opening-round bout to Romanian opponent Razvan Arnaut on technical superiority 10-0, while in 67kg, Ashu overcame his Norwegian rival Haavard Joergensen 5-4, before losing 10-0 on technical superiority to seventh-ranked Hungarian Krisztina Vancza.

In the 77kg category, Vikas got the better of Riccardo Abbrescia of Italy before going down in the pre-quarterfinal bout to Georgia's Luri Lomadze 8-0 on technical superiority.