Dhankar, Vicky get silver as gold eludes India

Xi’an (China), April 24

Indian wrestlers reaped a rich harvest of five medals in men’s freestyle but gold eluded them on the second day of the Asian Championships here today.

All five Indian wrestlers who competed today won a medal each but none of them could add to the gold Bajrang Punia had won yesterday. With the two silver and three bronze medals won today, India’s medal tally went up to one gold, three silver and four bronze. 

Amit Dhankar and Vicky lost their gold medal bouts in the 74kg and 92kg categories, respectively. Rahul Aware (61kg), Deepak Punia (86kg) and Sumit (125kg) won a bronze each to swell the Indian medal tally.

Dhankar, who won the gold in the 66kg category at the 2013 edition of the event, lost to Daniyar Kaisanov of Kazakhstan 0-5 in the final. “It is a little disappointing to not have got the gold for India once again,” said Dhankar after the final.

The 28-year-old Haryana wrestler began with a narrow 2-1 win over Mohammad Ashghar Nokhodilarimi of Iran in the qualification round. In the quarterfinals, he faced an injured opponent, Japan’s Yuhi Fujinami, and thus did not have to work hard. In the semifinals, Dhankar outplayed Ilgiz Dzhakypbekov of Kyrgyzstan 5-0. 

Vicky got a walkover in the quarterfinals as his opponent — Muhammad Inam of Pakistan — did not turn up for the bout. In the semifinals, he had a narrow 3-2 win over Xiao Sun of China. But in the gold medal bout, Alireza Mohammad Karimimachiani of Iran was too good for him. Karimimachiani outplayed Vicky 11-0 to win by Technical Superiority. “I wish I could have changed the score but my opponent was unfortunately too good,” said Vicky.

Three bronze

Aware, who won the 57kg gold at the Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast last year, produced a dominant display to beat Jincheol Kim of South Korea 9-2 in the men’s 61kg bronze medal play-off. After beating Jahongirmirza Turobov of Uzbekistan by Technical Superiority (10-0) in the qualification round, the 27-year-old Indian lost to Behnam Eshagh Ehsanpoor of Iran in the quarterfinals. Since Ehsanpoor reached the final, Aware got the opportunity to fight for a medal through the repechage round. He beat Siripong Jumpakam of Thailand in the repechage round through Technical Superiority (12-1).

In the 86kg freestyle category, Deepak Punia began on a bright note with a 11-7 win over Dovletmyrat Orazgylyjov of Turkmenistan in the qualification round before beating Lin Zushen of China in another victory by one point. In the semifinals, Deepak lost to Kamran Ghorban Ghasempour of Iran (0-10). In the bronze medal playoff, Deepak beat Bakhodur Kodirov of Tajikistan 8-2. 

Sumit got a lucky bronze as he lost straightway in the quarterfinals against Zhiwe Deng of China (0-3). But since Deng reached the final, Sumit made his way to the bronze-medal playoff, where he crushed Farkhod Anakulov of Tajikistan 8-2.

On Thursday, the women wrestlers will begin their campaign and Seema (50kg), Lalita Sehrawat (55kg), Manju (59kg), Divya Kakran (68kg) and Pooja (76kg) will be in action. — PTI