Archery: Deepika Kumari saves the day for India

LONDON, ENGLAND – JULY 27: An official inspects the target during the Archery Ranking Round on Olympics Opening Day as part of the London 2012 Olympic Games at the Lord

A famous comeback by Deepika Kumari raised hopes of Team India’s chances in the Archery Qualifiers in an otherwise disappointing campaign. After struggling with a slow start and being 12 points adrift even before the half way mark, Deepika staged a fantastic fightback and moved up slowly and steadily to cut the lead down to 9 points and was eventually placed 8th in the rankings.

The ranking rounds in Archery concluded at Lords today. The Men’s competition was held at 1.30 pm IST and the Women’s event was scheduled at 5.30 pm IST. A total of 128 Archers took part in 72 Arrow Rounds. South Korean, Im Dong Hyung broke his own world record. Korea finished 1-2-3 in the Men’s department and 1-2-3 and 1-2 in the Women’s category.

For India , Tarundeep Rai improved his performance in the second half as he climbed from 47th to 31st in the seeding. Rahul Banerjee finished with 655 points and Jayanta Talukdar ranked 53rd , was 14 points off Tarundeep.

Deepika Kumari started off slowly with just 50 points from a possible 60. But then consistently hit the arrow scoring 55 points to climb up the order. At the half way mark of 36 arrows, Deepika had climbed upto 18th. Then with 18 arrows remaining she entered the top10 bracket and got into the groove to score 662 points. Chekrovolu Swuro started well but then faded off and finished 50th. Bombayla Devi shot consistently and hovered around positions 10-30 throughout to finish at a creditable 22nd. Bombayla Devi performed extremely well as compared to her world ranking of 48.

Road to the Finals

Format – Team event : After the ranking rounds, the top 4 teams are placed in the Quarter Finals. Teams ranked between 5-12 play an eliminator to earn a place in the QF Team. The Indian Men’s team will face Japan in the 1/8 eliminator and then USA in the QF if we progress. Similarly, the Indian Women’s team which is placed 9th will face Denmark tomorrow.

Format – Individual event : After the ranking rounds, the top seed will play against the player ranked 64 and the No2 player will be up against the player ranked No 63. With this format Jayant Talukdar is now placed in Section 2 and will face J Wukie (USA) upfront. Godfrey (GBR) , Furukawa (JPN) and Dymatro Hrachov (UKR) are possible tough match-ups for Jayanta Talukdar.  Tarundeep Rai will face Korean BM Kim in Rd 2 whereas Rahul Banerjee has the other Korean JH OH in his group. In the Women’s department, Deepika will face A Olive (GBR) , Bombayla Devi is tied against E Psarra (GRE), however, Swuro will challenge a stronger opponent in Jennifer Nicholas (USA).