Paris 2024 Olympics archery: Dhiraj Bommadevara’s run comes to an end as Bhajan Kaur advances to the pre-quarterfinals.

KaamkiAugust 1, 2024

0 13 2 minutes read

Paris 2024 Olympics archery: Dhiraj Bommadevara’s run comes to an end as Bhajan Kaur advances to the pre-quarterfinals.

India’s Bhajan Kaur advanced to the pre-quarterfinals of the Paris 2024 Olympics at Les Invalides on Tuesday after winning two comfortable matches in the individual women’s archery competition.

Olympic archers participate in best-of-five sets in the individual events. Every archer has three sets of arrows to shoot, and two points are awarded to the archer with the highest total score. A set wins and each archer gets one point.

With a score of 7-3 (27-27, 27-29, 29-27, 27-25, 28-25), the 22nd-seeded Bhajan Kaur defeated the 43rd-seeded Syifa Nurafifah Kamal of Indonesia in the round of 64. After two sets, Kaur was behind 3-1, but she won the next three with four consecutive 10s.

Kaur defeated Wioleta Myszor, the 54th seed from Poland, in the round of 32, winning 6-0 (28-23, 29-26, 28-22). In Sunday’s team event, she was also the most reliable Indian archer.

In the round of 64, Myszor shocked Ankita Bhakat, the best Indian lady archer, who had emerged as the 11th seed in the ranking rounds on Thursday. Even though Bhakat had a 4-2 lead at one point, they ultimately fell 6-4 (27-26, 26-29, 27-28, 29-27, 28-27).

In the men’s event, Dhiraj Bommadevara, who placed fourth in the ranking round the previous week, defeated the 61st seed Adam Li of Czechia 7-1 (29-29, 29-26, 29-28, and 28-26) by hitting his mark regularly.

Bommadevara maintained his strong play in the round of 32 match against Canadian 36th seed Eric Peters; however, Peters scored seven straight 10s, including one in the shoot-off, to win the match.

After five sets, the scores were knotted at 5-5 (28-27, 28-29, 29-27, 30-30, 29-30). In the shoot-off, both archers nailed tens, although Eric’s shot was closer to the center.

On Wednesday, seasoned candidates Tarundeep Rai and Deepika Kumari will launch their campaigns.

Though she is the youngest, Bhajan Kaur, an 18-year-old, has shown herself to be the most reliable Indian woman recurve archer competing in this Olympics.

After winning back-to-back elimination round bouts on Tuesday at the Esplanade des Invalides in Paris, the 18-year-old advanced to the pre-quarterfinals.

Just 4-6 minutes before Kaur started her solo campaign, her colleague Ankita Bhakat lost against Poland’s Wioleta Myszor in the opening round of the elimination tournament.