Back with a bang: Indian women's team storms into final

A day after all of them slipped out of top-30 in the qualifying round to get a lowly 13th seed, the trio of Deepika Kumari, Ankita Bhakat and Simranjeet Kaur beat Ukraine, Britain and Turkey en route the summit clash.

Paris: India's recurve archers, who had a nightmarish qualification round in the women's event, bounced back strongly to storm into the final, confirming their first medal at the ongoing World Cup Stage 3 here on Thursday. A day after all of them slipped out of top-30 in the qualifying round to get a lowly 13th seed, the trio of Deepika Kumari, Ankita Bhakat and Simranjeet Kaur beat Ukraine, Britain and Turkey en route the summit clash.

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They will be against Chinese Taipei on Sunday. The Indian women's recurve trio started off by eliminating fourth-seed Ukraine 5-1 (57-53 57-54 55-55). Against Great Britain in the quarterfinals, they dropped just four points to down their opponents 6-0 (59-51 59-51 58-50). In the semifinals, they had a slow start, aggregating 56 in the first set but their eighth-seeded Turkish rivals Gulnaz Coskun, Ezgi Basaran and Yasemin Anagoz shot a poor 51 to concede the first set by five points.

The Indians stepped up in the second set to edge out their rivals by one-point before they went on to lose their first set of the day when the Turkish team won the third 55-54 to make it 2-4. Needing a tie in the fourth set to confirm their passage to the final, the Indians held their nerve and stood to their task for a 5-3 (56-51 57-56 54-55 55-55) win.

Luck also was on their side as they did not have to face their nemesis Koreans as the top-seeds were upset by eighth-seeded Turkish team in the quarters. In the final on Sunday, they will be up against the third seed Chinese Taipei, who have Rio Olympics team bronze medallist Lei Chien-Ying in the line up.

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The men's recurve team of Tarundeep Rai, Jayanta Talukdar and Pravin Jadhav, seeded eighth, was eliminated after losing first round against Switzerland. Having got a bye into the pre-quarters, the Indian trio lost 4-5 to Florian Faber, Keziah Chabin and Thomas Rufer in the shoot-off (53-57 58-54 49-53 58-50) (25-25).

The shoot-off also was a tie and the Swiss team was declared winner since its final arrow landed close to the centre. Locked two-all, Indians suffered badly in the third set shooting a series of five 8s, which proved to be decisive in the end.

PTI