Can men’s archery team end India’s Olympics jinx with a medal at Paris?

Paris [France], July 29 (ANI): The Indian men’s archery team, consisting of Dhiraj Bommadevara, Tarundeep Rai, and Pravin Jadhav, will be aiming to put an end to the country’s medal jinx at the Olympics in the quarterfinals of the Paris Olympics’s men’s team event on Monday.

Despite India’s success in the Archery arena at the Asian Games and Commonwealth Games, where the country has won 19 and eight medals, respectively, including three Asiad gold medals and two CWG golds, a medal at the Olympics has eluded Team India so far.

Dhiraj, Tarundeep, and Pravin will be up against Colombia or Turkiye in the quarterfinals at 6:31 PM and medal rounds will take place today itself.

In the ranking round, Dhiraj, Tarundeep, and Pravin, directly qualified for the quarter-finals of the event at the Paris Olympics 2024 by securing a third-place finish with 2013 points on Thursday. South Korea (2049 points) finished at the top of the rankings, followed by France (2025 points) in second place, while China finished fourth with 1998 points. All four teams, including India, have directly qualified for the quarterfinals of the competition.

On the other hand, the women’s team of Bhajan Kaur, Deepika Kumari, and Ankita Bhakat, directly qualified for the quarterfinals of the event at the Paris Olympics by securing a fourth-place finish with 1983 points. South Korea ended at the top of the list with 2046 points, followed by China (1996) and Mexico (1986).

Later on, one of the biggest Olympic medal hopes in archery, Deepika, put on a disappointing performance in the women’s team event as they faced a defeat at the hands of the Netherlands in the quarterfinals of the Paris Olympics. The Dutch team proved too strong for the Indian trio, winning the match with a decisive 6-0 scoreline.

The Indian team, consisting of Ankita Bhakat, Bhajan Kaur, and Kumari, struggled to find their rhythm throughout the match. While Bhajan Kaur showed glimpses of brilliance, her teammates Ankita Bhakat and Deepika Kumari struggled to maintain consistency.

This was Kumari’s fourth appearance at the Olympics and a medal was expected given her experience and consistency in other events leading upto the tournament. She was also a former world number one in the women’s circuit on numerous occasions. But her list of heartbreaks continued as she could not move beyond the quarterfinals.

While the individual events are yet to start and India rests all of its hopes on them, the contingent would love to have a team’s event Olympic medal in archery.

A men’s team medal would also be a perfect tribute to the sheer hard work and determination of 40-year-old veteran Tarundeep, who has kept himself going on the archery circuit ever since his debut at the 2004 Olympics in Athens. His best performance across the men’s team/singles event at the Olympics is a quarterfinal finish with the men’s recurve team at the Tokyo Olympics 2020.