Asian Games 2018: Indian men, women settle for silver in compound archery event

The Indian men’s and women’s teams failed to go past South Korea in their respective finals of the compound archery event as they ended with silver medals on Monday. Both the men’s and women’s finals were well-fought ones. The Indian women failed in the final set and the men, unfortunately, ended up becoming the second-best after the final progressed to the shoot-offs with the fourth set tied at 229-229.

After a poor show in the recurve category, both these silver medals would be nothing short of a welcome addition.

The team of Abhishek Verma, Rajat Chauhan and Aman Saini got the Indian men’s team off to a fantastic start in the final as they shot a maximum 60 in the opening set, in comparison to South Korea’s 56. But with the progress of the game, the performance levels of the Indians dropped down as they ended up with 54, compared to Korea’s 58 in the second set which equalled up things at 114-114.

India, however, managed to win the third set with a two-point advantage at 58-56 ahead of the final round. Senior archer Verma then shot a couple of 10 pointers which the judges ruled two 9s to 10s and eventually it all came down to the shoot-off with the scores tied at 229-229.

In the final, Korea shot 10-9-10 compared to India’s 9-10-10 and it was the former who edged out on the win via measured win after the score was tied because of the fact that they had their 10s closer to the bull’s eye than the defending champions.

“You can’t say much about finals like these. The wind direction also played a role. It was just bad luck for us today,” Verma said, as quoted by The Times of India after the match.

Earlier in the day, the Indian women’s team came close but still couldn’t get past defending champions South Korea in the final. The team comprising of Muskar Kirar, Madhumita Kumari and Surekha Vennam ended with a maiden silver at the Games. India had won the bronze medal in the Incheon edition of the competition four years ago. The Indian women’s team put up a brave fight against Korea until the fourth set (which was the only eight pointer in the match). The defending champions came out victorious in the final set 58-55 and the final set 231-228. India won the first set-one which included five ten pointers by a 59-57 margin. Korea then bounced back winning the second set by clinching it 58-56 to equal things up at 115-115.

“We have improved on our last time’s performance so that it is a big positive. The wind conditions were tricky but we were pretty consistent until the final set. We are really happy with our performance. The support from the central government has been great, “said Surekha, as reported by the Press Trust of India. Surekha, 22, was part of the bronze-winning team in 2014. The Koreans took the first shot in the match and when asked that whether shooting second put pressure on them, she said, “We don’t think like that.”

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