Competing in 87kg category wrestler rewrites history and becomes third Indian to win yellow metal in Greco-Roman
Wrestler Sunil Kumar won India’s first Gold medal in the opening day of Asian Wrestling Championship 2020 here at KD Jadhav stadium on Tuesday after beating Kyrgyzstan opponent Azat Salidinov 5-0 in the final match of 87kg Greco-Roman category.
Last edition Silver medallist dominated the entire game and didn’t allowed his counterpart to gain any sort of breathing space and in process put a full stop to country’s 27-year drought for the yellow metal. Sunil now becomes only the third Indian ever to achieve this feat.
His comprehensive defence was able to keep Salidinov at bay for most of the bout. Salidinov didn't have an answer to the strategy of Sunil and finally went down pretty easily.
Earlier on his way to the final Sunil made an impressive comeback in the semi-final bout. He came back from 1-8 down to win the bout 12-8. This was an improvement for Sunil from his 2019 performance in the same tournament where he won a Silver Medal.
Speaking after the win he said, “I am feeling happy to have earned India's first Gold Medal today (Tuesday). I have worked really hard on my ground techniques and it feels good to have done better than my last year's performance.”
Before Sunil’s historic Gold medal win, Arjun Halakurki (55kg) opened India’s medal account with a Bronze medal defeating Donghyeok Won of Korea.
Arjun started the bout slowly and was down by 1-4 in the first period. But, Arjun didn't give up and came back strongly snatching six straight points with a combination of good defence and attack. The final score at the end of the bout was 7-4 in favour of Arjun.
However, India’s third medal hope Mehar Singh (130 kg) suffered a setback as he lost his bout against Roman Kim of Kyrgyzstan by a narrow scoreline of 2-3. Mehar was majorly suffering the aftereffects of his wrist injury which he suffered in his semi-final bout earlier.
In other winners of the day, Iran's Pouya Mohammad Naserpour won 55kg Gold medal with a comfortable 8-0 win over Uzbekistan’s Jasurbek Ortikboev. While, 63kg Gold went to Uzbekistan's Elmurat Tasmuradov, who win with a scoreline of 9-0 against Korean Jinseub Song. Also, Kazakhstan's Tamerlan Shadukayev bags 77kg title.
Today, national champion in 60kg category and last edition Bronze medallist, Gyanender will fight the biggest battle of his life against reigning world champion Kenichiro Fumita of Japan in the quarterfinals.
While the youngest member of India’s Greco-Roman squad Ashu will enter the mat against unherald Fu Hao Lin of Chinese Taipei. And if he wins, in the semis, he will play the winner of Mohammad Alhasan of Syria vs Makhmud Bakhshilloev of Uzbekistan. Bakhshilloev won the Rome ranking series Gold and also won the world championships Silver medal in 2019.
Also in the 72kg Non-Olympic category, Aditya Kundu, who is making a comeback to the Indian team after winning 2017 Commonwealth Championship Gold will be up against Alijon Khuseynov of Uzbekistan who is making his senior debut at the Asian Championships.
While in the Olympic category of 97kg, national champion in the weight Hardeep has drawn Abdollah Saravi of Iran in the last 8 battle. Under 23 world Bronze medallist, Saravi will be a tough nut to crack for Hardeep and he needs to be at his best to put it across the Iranian.
