Shanghai, May 7 (IANS) India’s men’s and women’s teams booked their spots in the compound team finals at the second stage of the Archery World Cup after respective semifinal wins.
The men’s team featuring ever-consistent Abhishek Verma alongside Ojas Pravin Deotale and Rishabh Yadav narrowly defeated Denmark, 232-231, in a tight semifinal.
The men’s team, which topped the qualification leaderboard with 2134, received the first round bye and began their campaign with a 239-232 quarterfinal win over Great Britain.
Deotale, a bronze medallist at the Central Florida stage one month ago, praised the team’s preparation and focus.
“We’ve practised for the team match to be in the finals. In Florida, we were hoping for a different colour of a medal, and this time we did it. Verma and Yadav also did pretty well. We are not looking about who is against us, we are just focusing on ourselves that we have to shoot good. We are not competing with any other teams or any other player. We are just competing for us. We have to score,” he told World Archery.
The women’s team, which had also received a bye in the opening round after topping the qualification with 2114 points, reached the gold medal match by outshooting Great Britain 232-230, in a lineup that included world number one Ella Gibson, following their 232-229 quarterfinal win over eighth-ranked Kazakhstan.
Denmark won bronze in the compound men’s team event, while Turkiye took third place on the women’s side.
Both men’s and women’s will take on Mexico in their respective gold medal matchg, scheduled for Saturday.
Earlier in the day, Korea broke the compound men’s team match world record in their first-round matchup against Macao. The team of Kim Jongho, Choi Eun Gyu and Choi Yonghee hit the 10-ring with 100 percent accuracy – 24 10s out of 24 arrows – becoming the first team in history to complete a perfect match.
The record was previously held by the USA’s Jesse Broadwater, Braden Gellenthien and compound legend Reo Dee Wilde, who shot just one shy at 239 during the Turin 2011 World Archery Championships.
However, Korea were unable to follow up on their astonishing achievement as they hey were defeated by Mexico, 237-232 in the semifinals and then lost to Denmark in the bronze medal match.
–IANS
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