Asian Wrestling C'ships: India bags 3 bronze in Greco-Roman on day 2

After the record-breaking gold medal win on day one of the Asian Wrestling Championships, Indian grapplers in the Greco-Roman category had to settle for three bronze medals on the second day of the competition at the KD Jadhav Hall in Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium in New Delhi.

Youngsters Ashu, Aditya Kundu and Hardeep managed to have the consolation of a podium finish, after having missed a shot at the gold medal.

Sunil Kumar, on Tuesday, had overpowered Azat Salidinov of Kyrgyzstan 5-0 in the 87kg summit bout to win India's first Greco-Roman gold medal in Asian Wrestling Championships in 27 years.

India now has five medals in the championships, after Kumar's historic gold and Arjun Halakurki's bronze in 55kg Greco-Roman category on Tuesday.

Earlier, on day 2, India had qualified for four bronze medal bouts, but grappler Gyanender lost to Uzbekistan’s Islomjon Bakhramov 0-6 in the 60kg category.

Ashu beat Syria's Abdulkarim Mohammad Al-Hasan 8-1 while Kundu defeated Nao Kusaka of Japan 8-0 inside one and a half minutes in a lop-sided 72kg bronze medal bout. Later in the evening, Hardeep beat Kyrgyzstan's Beksultan Makhamadzhanovich Makhmudov 3-1 to claim India's third bronze of the day.

After the match, an elated Ashu said, “It feels great to earn a bronze medal in my first ever senior championship. I lost my semifinal bout as I spent a lot of time attacking, which I worked upon in this bout with more emphasis on defence. I am happy things went as planned.”

Ashu's victory over Muhammad Alhasan was redemption of the loss that he faced in the semifinal, where he lost against the Uzbek Makhmud Bakhshilloev due to a technical win awarded to the latter.

For Kundu, it was his first Asian Championship and his second ever international tournament. The 23-year-old is now targeting an Olympics qualification but will have to reduce his weight to 67kg to be able to compete at the Tokyo Olympics later this year. “It feels good to have won the bronze medal. I lost out on my gold medal match but I am happy I could play as per my strategy in this game and thereby win the bout,” said Kundu, after his win.