Dismal show by Indian recurve archers

Kolkata, May 5, 2011: Indian recurve archers fell like nine pins in the individual elimination round of the men’s and women’s section of the World Cup (Stage I) at Porec, Croatia, on Wednesday. The only exception was rookie Seema Verma who lost to second-seeded Korean Ki Bo Bae 0-6 in the quarterfinals.

According to a press release of Indian Archery Association, among the men, only Tarundeep Rai managed to enter the pre-quarterfinals where he also lost to top seed Korean Oh Jin Hyek 3-7.

The worst was National men’s champion Viswash who bowed out in the first round to Dutch opponent Tim Freriks, ranked way below him in this championship, 0-6.

National women’s champion Deepika Kumari, ranked fifth and seeded in the third round, had the ignominy of losing to a rival ranked 32 ranks below her. Katrina Lipiarska of Poland won 6-4.

CWG gold medallist Rahul Banerjee, ranked ninth, was a second round victim going down to 57th ranked Hugh Mac Donald of Canada 2-6. Gold medallist at Porec in 2006 and 2009, Jayanta Talukdar, seeded 19th, produced a real shocker falling to 99th ranked unknown Bulgarian Vencislav Velikov 4-6.

Two other Indian ladies, 11th ranked L. Bombayla Devi fell to 22nd ranked Maja Buskbjerg Jager of Denmark 3-7 in the third round and Rimil Buruily, qualifying at the 51st place, lost to 62nd ranked Alison Williamson of Great Britain, silver medalists at the Delhi CWG, 2-6.

In the compound qualifications, archers shot the new 50-metre round where the American archers set three new world records. Men’s individual Reo Wilde broke his own world record of 708 set on 24 April 2011 with 711 points. The compound men's team established a new world record with 2116 points, improving on its own mark of 2112 set on 8 April 2011 in Phoenix, USA. With a total of 2083 points the compound women's team eclipsed the world record set by Italy at theEuropean Grand Prix in Antalya back in April (2044).

Chinna Raju Srither and National Champion Namita Yadav were the best Indian compound archers on view. Srither occupied 36th place with a total of 692 points. Namita was 19th with 675. Chittibomma Jignas (687), Isaiah Rajender Sanam (685) and Ritul Chatterjee (679) took the 57th, 60th and 71st spots respectively. The Indian team was ranked 12th with a total of 2064.

Jhano Hansdah was the second best Indian woman placed at 20th with 675. Gagandeep Kaur was 26th with 673 and Bheighyabati Chanu was 55th with 646. The first three ensured India ended sixth with a total of 2023.

The Indian mixed team pair of Srither and Namita was placed 12th with 1367.