Antalya (Turkey): Indian men’s compound team of Abhishek Verma, Aman Saini and Rajat Chauhan defeated France 232-230 in the final to win the gold medal at the 2022 Archery World Cup Stage 1, here on Saturday.
The trio of Abhishek, Aman and Rajat were trailing by three points in the second set but produced a perfect score of 60 in the third to close the gap and shot 59 in the final set to snatch the victory. This was India’s first medal at the ongoing meet.
Later in the day, India’s mixed compound team of Abhishek Verma and Muskan Kirar narrowly missed out on the bronze medal, going down to Croatia 156-157.
Apart from these two events, Indian archers have gone through a challenging campaign at the first stage of the Archery World Cup.
In the men’s individual recurve, only London 2012 Olympian Jayanta Talukdar could make the top eight. Tokyo Olympian Tarundeep Rai lost in the round of 32, Sachin Gupta crashed out in the round of 64 while Neeraj Chauhan was eliminated in the opening contest.
Meanwhile, the women’s individual recurve saw Ridhi reaching the round of 16. Komalika Bari lost in the round of 32 while Anikta Bhakat and Simranjeet Kaur could not go past the first round.
The compound archers also struggled, with only Rajat Chauhan and Priya Gurjar making the top eight in the men’s and women’s individual events, respectively. Asian Games gold medallist Abhishek Verma was ousted in the round of 32.
The recurve teams (men and women) and women’s compound team could also not reach the medal rounds. However, the recurve mixed team, featuring Tarundeep Rai and Ridhi will play for the gold against Great Britain on Sunday.
(IANS)
