Shooters bag 5 more podium places
Glasgow: Two-time Olympic medallist Sushil Kumar spearheaded a sparkling show as Indian grapplers dominated the wrestling arena with three gold medals after the shooters ended their campaign on a rousing note with five more podium finishes on the sixth day of competition at the 20th Commonwealth Games here on Tuesday.
Sushil expectedly bagged gold in the men’s 75kg freestyle category while Amit Kumar won the yellow metal in the men’s 57kg. In the women’s section, Vinesh Phogat finished on top in the 48kg.
Rajeev Tomar, however, had to settle for a silver in the men’s 125 kg freestyle event after going down to Canada’s Korey Jarvis 3-0 in the final.
Earlier, Indian shooters continued to dominate with the unassuming Sanjeev Rajput and Harpreet Singh clinching a silver medal each, but there was heartbreak for Olympic silver winner Vijay Kumar.
London Olympic silver medallist Vijay made a shock exit in the qualification round of the men’s 25m rapid fire pistol event.
Vijay shot a total of 555 points in the two qualification rounds to finish seventh and missed out on a place in the final round. The top six in the qualification round qualify for the finals.
Star marksman Gagan Narang had to be content with a bronze while Manavjit Singh Sandhu and Lajja Gauswami also finished third on the podium, as the Indian shooting team finished with an impressive tally of 17 medals at the Games.
The wrestlers, however, took the limelight away with their stunning show on the mat.
The 31-year-old Sushil asserted his class as he won all his four bouts of the day quite comfortably.
In the gold-medal bout against Qamar Abbas of Pakistan, Sushil had an easy outing. Even before one could blink, the contest was over as the Indian pinned down his rival to clinch the gold with a 8-0 scoreline in under two minutes.
In no time, Sushil raced to a 6-0 lead and added two more points to finish off the contest.
Amit Kumar defeated Ebikweminomo Welson of Nigeria 6-2 in his final bout. The 20-year-old Indian started off well and completely dominated the first round to post a comfortable 4-0 win. The Nigerian, however, fought back and the two wrestlers gave each other a tough time in the next round and they could bag just two points each.
But with the four points in his kitty already from the opening round, the youngster from India prevailed over his opponent to pocket the yellow metal.
In what turned out to be a close battle between Vinesh and England’s Yana Rattigan in the finals of the women’s 48kg event, the Indian won 11-8.
Vinesh was down 2-4 in the first round and was facing a tough challenge from her English opponent. But she managed to earn two points to tie it at 4-4 before she could put her rival down again to bag another two just in time to wrap up the opening round 6-4.
The second round was also a fierce contest but the Indian somehow maintained her composure to earn the second gold for the country in wrestling.
Tomar failed to do much in his gold-medal bout, as he failed to earn even a single point. His Canadian rival, meanwhile, snatched a few technical points in his favour to eke out a narrow 3-0 win and bag the gold.
After Tuesday’s showing, India’s medal tally went upto 35 with 10 gold, 15 silver and 10 bronze, settling into sixth place at the time of going to press.
Australia top the table with 33 gold medals and 97 overall, while England are second with 32 gold and 87 in total.
Before the wrestlers’ show, shooter Narang, the biggest Indian name in the fray, failed to defend his gold in the men’s 50m rifle 3 position.
The 31-year-old Narang, who won a bronze in the 2012 London Olympics in 10m air rifle event, shot 423.3 while Rajput aggregated 436.8 in the final held under windy conditions in Dundee, near here.
Harpreet survived two rounds of a nerve-wrecking shoot-off and brushed aside a penalty point against him to claim silver in the men’s 25m rapid fire pistol event.
The 33-year-old Harpreet saved India from disaster by bagging the silver after Olympic silver medallist Vijay failed to qualify for the final round.
Harpreet, who topped the qualification round, hit the target 21 times in the six-shooter final, which featured eight rounds of five shots each. (PTI)