September 26, 2023
ISLAMABAD – The Indian women’s cricket team scripted history by winning the first ever Gold medal after beating Sri Lanka in the final. Electing to bat, India were bolstered by the return of skipper Harmanpreet Kaur, and put 116 runs on the board on a track that offered help to the spinners. In reply, Sri Lanka could only manage 97. Smriti Mandhana and Jemimah Rodrigues were the top scorers for India with 46 and 42 runs, respectively. With the ball, Titas Sadhu took 3/6 in her four overs to restrict the Lankan batting order.
India won their first gold medal of the Hangzhou Asian Games with a new world record as the trio of Rudranksh Patil, Aishwary Tomar and Divyansh Panwar teamed up to win the men’s 10m air rifle title on Day 2 of the competition.
The trio notched together a whopping total of 1893.7 points, which also proved to be the new world record, surpassing China’s record of 1893.3 points.
Patil and Tomar have qualified for the individual final too. Panwar also finished in the top 8 but can’t shoot in the final as only two per one NOC.
In men’s individual 10m Air Rifle event, Aishwary Pratap Singh Tomar bagged a bronze medal. In what turned out to be an intense final, Tomar ended up with a score of 228.8 to get India’s fourth medal shooting at the Asian Games. Rudrankksh Patil, the other Indian in the final, however, had to endure a heartbreaking fourth finish.
After a remarkable performance from the Rifle shooters, India’s Pistol shooters added a Bronze medal to the medal tally with the 25m Rapid Fire Pistol Team finishing third in the event.
The trio of Anish, Vijayveer & Adarsh showcased their skills with a total score of 1718 pts (just 47 pts shy of Gold-winning China). Korea ended up as the second placed team on the podium.
Elsewhere, in men’s four rowing final, the Indian team comprising Jaswinder, Bheem, Punit and Ashish grabbed the bronze medal with a time of 6:10:81.
Indian rowers continued to impress as the men’s quadruple sculls team also bagged the bronze medal.
The side consisting Satnam, Parminder, Jakar and Sukhmeet, finished with a timing of 6:08:61, behind China (6:02:65) and Uzbekistan (6:04:64).
However, Balraj Panwar missed out on a medal by a whisker, finishing a hearbreaking fourth in the men’s singles sculls final. The final distance of 500m cost him a place in the podium, and eventually ended with a timing of 7:08.79s.
In swimming, Srihari Nataraj qualified for the men’s 50m backstroke final, after finishing in sixth place in the heats.
All eyes will be on the Indian women’s cricket team, who lock horns with Sri Lanka in the gold medal match. Besides from that the Indian mixed table tennis team will be in action later in the day. The men’s and women’s TT teams were knocked out following their respective defeats on Day 1. The men’s went down to South Korea, while Thailand got the better off the Indian women.
On Monday, India won five medals (3 silver and 2 bronze).