Most of the Indian shooters including Olympic champion Abhinav Bindra and Gagan Narang (double world record holder and the hero of the recent Commonwealth Games) have landed in Guangzhou for the Asian Games to be staged from November 12 to 27.
“The village is fantastic. It is neat and clean and the environment is very good. Looking forward to the challenge,” said Abhinav Bindra, happy to be back in China after 2008 when he had won the Olympic gold in Beijing.
Gagan Narang, with eight gold medals from two editions of the Commonwealth Games, will have the honour of carrying the national flag at the opening ceremony.
“I am proud to carry the flag and hope to give my best,” said Narang who will be competing in the 50-metre rifle 3-position and prone events apart from the 10-metre air rifle.
Incidentally, it was at this range that Narang had beaten the Chinese to the gold in the World Cup in 2006 after the Melbourne Commonwealth Games to win the Olympic quota place for Beijing. Actually, the real challenge for the Indian shooters will be to win gold medals. In the last edition, Jaspal Rana was instrumental in Indian shooters winning three gold medals. Two of them were his individual medals in standard and centrefire pistol events. It was he who won the only individual gold medal in 1994 in the Hiroshima Asian Games when he was barely 18.
Only Randhir Singh, Secretary-General, Indian Olympic Association, has won an individual gold medal in shooting for India in the Asian Games, apart from Rana.
With a clutch of world champions in Bindra, Manavjit Singh Sandhu and Tejaswini Sawant, other than a string of world-class shooters in Ronjan Sodhi, Vijay Kumar, Omkar Singh, Sanjeev Rajput and Asher Noria, the jumbo Indian contingent can really hope for some gold.
“People are expecting a lot after the 30-medal haul in the Commonwealth Games. Asian Games is different. Jaspal won three gold medals last time. He is not in the squad now. Of course, we have some capable shooters who can win gold on their day.
“They have been shooting top scores, and it remains to be seen whether they do it here,” said National coach Prof. Sunny Thomas from Guangzhou, who remarked that it was a pleasant surprise that the shooters won 14 medals last time in a total of 53.
“Gagan can do it, Abhinav Bindra can do it. Sanjeev Rajput shot 595 in the World Cup final, and 597 in the camp. Our double trap shooter Ronjan Sodhi is very strong. The double trap team can win the gold, as Australia is not there,” said Prof. Thomas, even as he talked about Vijay Kumar coming good in centrefire and rapidfire pistol events.
The coach said that the Indian shooters were in a good mood after so much of cash awards and had the confidence to make an impact at the Asian Games.
