Asian Games: Indian duo of Divyansh Singh Pawar and Ramita Jindal misses bronze after losing a thrilling contest

India missed the opportunity to finish third in the 10m Air Rifle Mixed Team before putting an emphatic fight against South Korean pair Hajun Park and Eunseo Lee after the scores were tied. The Indian duo were leading earlier with a scoreline of 15-13 but the opponents bounced back to level the scores and win the bout to claim the bronze.

Hangzhou(China): India's Divyansh Panwar and Ramita Jindal missed the 10m mixed air rifle bronze medal by the skin of the teeth as the country's shooters hit a bump on Tuesday after cruising for two consecutive days at the Asian Games, here. South Korea won the bronze after an engrossing contest, which saw both teams come up with breath-taking efforts and give it their all in the fight for third place. The Korean pair of Park Hajun and Lee Eunseo finally won 20-18.

A scintillating performance was predicted for the crack pair of 20-year-old Divyansh, and teenager Ramita, but the start didn't quite go as expected as the pair qualified for the finals placed sixth and last after the qualification round. Unlike the individual 10m air rifle event, where eight shooters qualify for the finals, in mixed teams six pairs make the medal round.

Here too, the top two placed teams compete for the gold, while the remaining four pairs are divided into two groups and compete for two bronze medals. While Korea won one bronze, the second one went to the Kazakh pair of Satpayev Islam and Alexandra Le who defeated the Iranian combination of Amirmohammad Nekounam and Shermineh Amirani 17-11. Panwar, who was part of the 10m air rifle gold-winning team on Monday, shot 314.3, while 19-year-old Ramita shot 313.9 to aggregate 628.2.

It was a nerve-wracking bronze-medal match between India and Korea with the Indians leading 9-3 at one point in the race to reach the winning score of 16. But Korea staged a remarkable recovery in the ensuing series to finally drub the Indians 20-18.