In the present archery World Championships, India’s compound women’s team, made up of Jyothi Surekha Vennam, Parneet Kaur, and Aditi Swami, shocked reigning champions Colombia 220-216 to advance to the final.
However, following narrow losses in the compound men’s and mixed-team competitions, Indian aspirations were dashed.
In the men’s competition, the Netherlands defeated Abhishek Verma, Ojas Deotale, and Prathamesh Jawkar 230-235 in the quarterfinals.
Deotale and Jyothi Surekha lost to the USA 154-153 in the round of the final eight in the mixed division.
Earlier, Indian archers lost their chance to qualify for the Paris Olympics team quota after losing in the quarterfinals of both the men’s and women’s recurve competitions.
The top three finishers in both the team and individual competitions will get first tickets to the Olympics the following year.
Dhiraj Bommadevara, Rajat Chauhan, and Tushar Shelke’s men’s recurve team fell to India’s arch-enemy Korea 1-5 (49-55, 57-57, 53-55).
Bhajan Kaur, Ankita Bhakat, and Simranjeet Kaur’s women’s recurve trio fell short of the Netherlands 2-6 (49-48, 52-53, 48-50, 54-57). They won the first set to go up 2-0, but then dropped the following three.
The individual phase of the current event, which begins on Thursday, will be India’s next chance to advance.
The greatest hope will be Army soldier Bommadevara, who earned the second seed in the men’s solo recurve qualifying round.
Despite receiving a favorable draw as a result of their fourth-place performance in the qualifying, India fell short in the mixed recurve team event.
Bommadevara and Ankita, who had a bye into the round of 16, fell short in the shoot-off against lower-ranked Italy 4-5 (35-37, 36-35, 39-37, 34-36) (16-17).
The Continental Games, which for India would be the Hangzhou Asian Games in October, would serve as the next round of qualifiers for the Paris Games. There, the mixed team champions and two individuals per gender will advance.
The last two qualifying competitions are the Asian Championship in Bangkok in November and the Antalya World Cup in June of the following year.
However, even in the worst-case scenario, India will still have a chance to advance since they are now ranked in the top 8 in the world, which will be determined by the list that was updated on June 24, 2024.
