ISSF World Cup: Swapnil lands India 2nd medal

New Delhi, June 2

India’s Swapnil Kusale won a silver medal in the men’s 50m rifle 3 positions (3P) event at the ISSF World Cup in Baku, Azerbaijan, to give the country its second medal of the competition.

The 26-year-old went down 10-16 to Rio Olympics silver medallist Serhiy Kulish of Ukraine in the gold medal match today. This was Kusale’s first individual ISSF World Cup stage medal.

The 12-member Indian rifle squad now has a gold and a silver, climbing to the fifth position in the medals tally from the overnight ninth.

Kusale played a tremendous 3P match over two days of intense competition in a world-class field.

He finished second to Kulish in the top-eight ranking round earlier today, before going down to the Ukrainian champion again in the gold medal match.

Kulish shot 411 in the ranking round to Kusale’s 409.1 as Finland’s Aleksi Leppa took the bronze with 407.8.

The top-two, thus, finished in the same order right from the qualification rounds on Wednesday.

In the final, Kusale did put up a fight but the Ukrainian finished strongly to put the contest beyond him. Kulish shot four high 10s in his last five shots to Kusale’s three low 10s and two 9s.