Akhil Sheoran bags bronze on final day of Cairo World Cup

Akhil Sheoran won the bronze medal in the rifle 3-position event as India achieved top spot on the podium in the shooting World Cup at Cairo in Egypt on Wednesday. Akhil shot the second-best qualification score of 589 before placing behind Jiri Privratsky and Romain Aufrere. He beat qualification topper Oleh Tsarkov (590) of Ukraine for the bronze.

Cairo:Paris Olympic quota winner Akhil Sheoran won his second career individual ISSF World Cup stage medal, clinching the men's 50m rifle 3 positions bronze here on Wednesday. Akhil shot 451.8 in the eight-man 45-shot final, after qualifying in second place with a score of 589.

The seasoned Jiri Privratsky of the Czech Republic won gold with 462.9, while France's double junior world champion Romain Aufrere bagged silver after finishing with 460.5. The effort meant that India concluded their engagements at the season opening World Cup stage with medals of every colour. Their final tally read two gold, three silver and one bronze as they topped another ISSF World Cup stage.

Akhil's first shot of 10.3 in the kneeling position was second best in the eight-man field. He maintained his second position after 10 as Italian Lorenzo Bacci took over the lead with reigning air rifle world champion Victor Lindgren rising up to third, just 0.1 behind the Indian. Firing a perfect 10.9 in his 15th and final kneeling position shot gave Akhil the lead for the first time in the match.

Akhil was 0.1 ahead of Aufrere at that stage and a second 10.9 for his 10th shot in the second prone position extended that lead to 0.4, as the duo began to widen the gap with others. By the end of the 15 prone shots, Akhil's tally of 312.5 was a healthy 1.9 ahead of Aufrere. His final prone series score was a scorching 53.5.

The standing position is where things changed dramatically and for the first time in the match, Akhil fired shots in the nine-ring. As Kazakh Konstantin Malinovskiy and Lindgren became the first to be eliminated after 40 shots, Aufrere had overtaken Akhil by 0.3. Privratsky was also surging and Akhil managed to clinch bronze as a final shot of 7.9 by Aufrere gave Privratsky gold.

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