KOLKATA: Indian archers opened their account with the women's compound team winning the bronze medal at the World Cup Stage 2 at Gwangju, South Korea on Wednesday. Their men's counterpart who won gold at Antalya Turkey last month, will play World No. 4 France in a repeat of the World Cup Stage I final.
The fifth seeded women's compound team of Avneet Kaur, Muskan Kirar and Priya Gurjar, who got a bye into the quarterfinals, saw off Chinese Taipei 228-226, but lost to Korea 228-230 despite leading midway in the semifinal.
However, there was little to separate the two sides in the team bronze medal match as only one point separated India and Turkey after four ends. In the fourth, the Turkish side, who won the silver at the last World Cup, took a slender lead of 174-173. But the Indian girls delivered an excellent 59 to shut off Turkey's 57 and win 232-231. "The wind was very tricky," stated Gurjar.
"We knew it was going to be a tight match and we were separated by only a point. We told ourselves we had to shoot a 60 in the last end," Kirar said.
The men's trio of Abhishek Verma, Aman Saini and Rajat Chauhan, who qualified fourth, punched above their weight to shock USA 234-228 in the quarterfinals before humbling hosts top seeded South Korea in a shoot-off 2 33-233 (29-26) to make the final.
Later in the day, the Indian men's recurve side qualified seventh while their women's counterpart made it at fifth spot. The mixed recurve side also qualified seventh.
