Women grapplers Vinesh Phogat and Geetika Jakhar bagged a bronze medal each in 48kg and 63kg freestyle events respectively as India made an impressive start in their wrestling campaign at the Asian Games in Incheon on Saturday.
Glasgow Commonwealth Games gold winner Vinesh needed two minutes 31 seconds to beat Narangerel Erdenesukh of Mongolia in a completely one-sided bronze-medal bout. The referee stopped the bout after the Indian had taken 10—0 lead over her hapless opponent.
Earlier, she made it to quarterfinals after pinning down Yongmi Pak of North Korea in a 3—1 ‘decision by point’ verdict. The Indian then recorded a verdict-by-fall win over Dauletbike Yakhshi Muratova of Uzbekistan in quarterfinals before losing to Eri Tosaka of Japan in the semifinals.
Geetika produced an even more dominant performance in her bronze-medal bout against Vietnam’s Ly Thi Hien as she pinned down her opponent in just 55 seconds in a victory by fall verdict.
A silver medallist at the CWG, Geetika defeated Kazakhstan’s Yekaterina Larionova 3—1 by decision by points in her first bout before outplaying Jaratrawee Autnun of Thaliand in a victory by fall verdict to make it to the semifinals. In the semifinals, however, Geetika lost to Zhuoma Xilou of China.
It was, however curtains for men’s freestyle wrestlers as both Amit Kumar and Parveen Rana lost in the Round of 16 to their respective Japanese opponents.
Much was expected of CWG gold medallist Amit Kumar, but he turned out to be completely off-colour against Fumitaka Morishita, going down 1—3 in the 57kg category.
Praveen was beaten by Takafumi Kojima with an identical scoreline in the 70kg division.
In 2010 Guangzhou Asian Games, India had won just three bronze in wrestling.
