Asian Games 2023: India win five medals on Day 13 in archery, badminton, sepaktakraw, bridge

India clinched a bronze medal in recurve women’s team archery event at the 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou on Friday. It is India’s fourth medal in archery and 87th overall in what has been a historic campaign.

The team of Ankita Bhakat, Bhajan Kaur and Simranjeet Kaur emerged better than the Vietnam trio, winning 6-2 (56-22, 55-56, 57-50, 51-48).

India had qualified for the final after convincing and comfortable wins over Thailand (in the 1/8 Elimination Round), Japan (in the quarter-finals) before taking out the much-fancied South Korea (in the semi-finals).

Later, India won a silver medal in men’s recurve team archery after going down 1-5 to South Korea in the final. Team of Atanu Das, Dhiraj Bommadevara and Tushar Prabhakar were convincingly swept aside by the Koreans.

Wooseok Lee, Jinhyek Oh and Deok Je Kim took the opening and third sets 60-55 and 56-55 while levelling the second 57-57. Each set earns a team two points which ruled out the need for a fourth set.

India had qualified for the final after beating Hong Kong (6-0), Mongolia (5-4) and Bangladesh (5-3)

HS Prannoy wins bronze in men’s singles badminton

Prannoy clearly having issues with his back, even loses his back strap between a point, throws it away and keeps going against the home favourite. #AsianGames pic.twitter.com/jTte4hd6eH

— Dipankar Lahiri (@soiledshoes) October 6, 2023

HS Prannoy signed off from the Asian Games with a bronze medal, India’s first medal in men’s singles in 41 years, after going down in straight games to reigning All England champion China’s Li Shi Feng.

Prannoy, playing with a back injury, committed too many unforced errors to go down 16-21, 9-21 in a 51-minute contest.

It is India’s first medal in men’s singles badminton at an Asian Games since Syed Modi had won a bronze in 1982. Prannoy was part of India’s silver medal winning men’s team last week.

Prannoy seemingly ran out of gas after a physically and mentally draining quarter-final a day ago. In it, Prannoy squandered two match points while saving two of his own to beat 2021 All England champion Lee Zii Jia of Malaysia. Prannoy had come through 21-16, 21-23, 22-20 in that herculean 78 minute duel.

India win bronze in sepaktakraw