Den Bosch (The Netherlands): The Indian men’s recurve archery team secured the Olympic quota for the 2020 Tokyo Games by storming into the quarterfinals of the World Championships but there was heartbreak in store for the fancied women’s side here Wednesday.
The men’s team of Tarundeep Rai, Atanu Das and Pravin Jadhav put up a superlative show posting a 5-3 win over Canada to secure three-athlete quota for the first time since the 2012 London Olympics. At the 2016 Rio Olympics, India had an individual entry in Das, who made a pre-quarterfinal exit.
“We finally made it. We are gelling well as a team and looking forward to Tokyo now. This is the moment to keep going for 2020,” two-time Olympian Rai, said.
“I’m sure the opponents were feeling exactly the same pressure. So the key was to keep calm and it worked well for us,” the 35-year-old Army archer added.
But it turned out to be a day of contrasting fortunes for the women’s recurve team as senior archer Laishram Bombayla Devi misfired once, while Komalika Bari exposed her inexperience costing them the match 2-6 against lower-seeded Belarus.
Blaming luck, the three-time Olympian Bombayla said: “In practice, I was shooting well but there was misfortune and something happened during the competition and I misfired. It could have been an easy win. We will try our best next time.”
The Indian team in the women’s compound section, which is a non-Olympic category, entered the quarterfinals with a commanding 236-226 win over France.
PTI