New Delhi [India], March 22 (ANI): India won three more gold medals on Monday at the ongoing International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) World Cup Rifle/Pistol/Shotgun stage at New Delhi’s Dr Karni Singh Shooting range, to extend their lead at the top of the medal tally with six gold, four silver and four bronze.
The hosts won five medals in all on Monday to take their tally to 14. They began competition day four by winning the 10M Air Rifle Mixed Team event, followed by the 10M Air Pistol Mixed Team competition, before the Skeet Men’s team struck gold in the last final of the day. India also won Silver in the Women’s Skeet Team competition as well as a bronze in the 10M Air Pistol Mixed Team event.
The first final of the day pitted India’s former world number one pairing of Elavenil Valarivan and Divyansh Singh Panwar against Hungary’s Champion Rifle shooter Istvan Peni and Denes Eszter, who is ranked nine in the world and won the bronze in the individual Women’s 10M Air Rifle in this very World Cup.
As expected, it was a closely fought encounter, with both pairs tied 10-10 at one stage, before Elavenil and Divyansh broke away with some world-class Shooting, to get a 16-10 result in their favour. Earlier, the USA had won bronze, beating Poland 17-15 in the Bronze Medal match.
In the day’s second final, India’s young pistol aces Manu Bhaker and Saurabh Chaudhary began tentatively, but eventually found their groove to put it across Iran’s Golnoush Sebghatollahi and Javad Foroughi 16-12, in the 10M Air Pistol Mixed Team competition. Foroughi had earlier won the individual gold in Men’s 10M Air Pistol on Saturday.
The bronze medal in the event also went to India, when Yashaswini Deswal and Abhishek Verma beat the Turkish pair of Sevval Tarhan and Ismail Keles 17-13 in the Bronze Medal match.
India’s third gold of the day came in the last of the four finals when the Men’s Skeet Team comprising of Mairaj Ahmad Khan, Angad Vir Singh Bajwa, and Gurjoat Khangura beat a top-notch Qatar squad 6-2 in the Gold Medal match. The silver-winning Qatar team had Nasser Al-Attiya (Olympic bronze medallist), Rashid Hamad, who won the Men’s Skeet bronze at the Cairo Shotgun World Cup last month, and Ali Ahmed Al-Ishaq, currently ranked 45 in the world.
The only other gold medal on offer on the day was won by Kazakhstan in the Women’s Skeet team competition when they overcame a spirited young Indian team 6-4 in the Gold Medal match. Ganemat Sekhon, who became the first Indian woman to win an individual ISSF World Cup medal in Skeet on Sunday, when she won bronze in the Women’s Skeet competition on Sunday, followed that up with silver along with teammates Parinaaz Dhaliwal and Kartiki Singh Shekhawat. (ANI)
