- Ashu, Aditya Kundu, and Hardeep won bronze medals in their respective categories on Wednesday.
- All three medals came via Repechage to take India’s tally to five on the second day of the Asian Wrestling Championships at the KD Jadhav Indoor Stadium, Indira Gandhi Arena, New Delhi.
- On the first day of the competition, Sunil Kumar and Arjun Halakurji won the gold and bronze medal respectively.
India finished the Greco-Roman category at the Asian Wrestling Championships with five medals; their best-ever performance in the category. Ashu (67 kg), Aditya Kundu (72 kg), and Hardeep (97 kg) each won bronze medals in their respective categories on day 2 (Wednesday) at the KD Jadhav Indoor Stadium, Indira Gandhi Arena, New Delhi.
Final #WrestleNewDelhi Greco-Roman Team Standings:
🏆Iran 🇮🇷 (190 points)
🥈Uzbekistan 🇺🇿 (146 points)
🥉Kazakhstan 🇰🇿 (136 points)
FOURTH – Korea 🇰🇷 (130 points)
FIFTH – India 🇮🇳 (127 points)— United World Wrestling (@wrestling) February 19, 2020
All three medals came via Repechage to take India’s tally to five on the second day of the competition. A repechage is a practice allowing participants who failed to meet qualifying standards progress by a close margin to the next round.
Did you see?
Kumar SUNIL (IND) gave India 🇮🇳 their first Asian GR gold medal since Yadav POPPU (IND) won at 48kg in '93 in Hiroshima. He said, “India had not the 🥇 in 27 years. I got to know about it only before the final and it motivated me a lot.”#WreslteNewDelhi pic.twitter.com/1q7lF62x0C
— United World Wrestling (@wrestling) February 19, 2020
On the first day of the competition, Sunil Kumar won the gold medal by defeating Kyrgyzstan’s Azat Salidinov in the 87 kg category. Arjun Halakurji then won the bronze medal in the 55 kg category. India’s previous best performance in the Greco-Roman was 4 medals- 3 silver, 1 bronze in 2019.
67kg #WrestleNewDelhi GR Medal Match Results
🥇Hansu RYU 🇰🇷df. Makhmud BAKHSHILLOEV🇺🇿, 4-1
🥉Hossein ASSADI KOLMATI 🇮🇷 df. Tsuchika SHIMOYAMADA 🇯🇵, 5-3
🥉Ashu ASHU 🇮🇳 df. Abdwlkarim ALHASAN 🇸🇾, 8-1— United World Wrestling (@wrestling) February 19, 2020
“I am very happy, though not absolutely satisfied,” national team coach Hargobind Singh said. “We could have won one more gold today, but the boys could not stick to the strategy. However, it is still a commendable result,” he added.
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On Wednesday, Ashu began the charge by destroying Syrian grappler Abdwlkarim Mohammad Alhasan. Leading 3-1 at the end of the first period in his first senior competition, the 19-year-old hit top gears by adding 6 points to finish 9-1.
72kg #WrestleNewDelhi GR Medal Match Results
🥇Amin KAVIYANINEJAD 🇮🇷df. Ibragim MAGOMADOV 🇰🇿, 8-0
🥉Aditya KUNDU 🇮🇳 df. Nao KUSAKA 🇯🇵, 8-0
🥉Ruslan TSAREV 🇰🇬 df. Yan Kai CHEN (TPE), via fall— United World Wrestling (@wrestling) February 19, 2020
Like Ashu, Aditya Kundu dominated his Japanese counterpart Nao Kusaka 8-0. Kundu finished the game inside 90 seconds. The 23-year-old grappler trained by his farther and SAI coach Ranbir Singh Kundlu’s next step is to shift from the non-Olympic 72-kg category to 67 kg.
After his opening-round loss in the 97-kg category to Abdollah Saravi; Hardeep got a shot at redemption due to the Irani’s run to the final round. Hardeep then defeated Beksultan Makhmudhov in the attritional repechage clash 3-1. On Thursday, the women grapplers will be in focus as they compete in the 50 kg; 55 kg, 59 kg, 68 kg and 76 kg categories.
Thursday's #WrestleNewDelhi Schedule
Weight Classes: WW 50, 55, 59, 68 & 76kg
8:30 – Medical Examination and Weigh-In
11:30 – Qualification Rounds & Repechage
18:00 – Finals and Award Ceremonies— United World Wrestling (@wrestling) February 20, 2020
