Asian Games 2023: India win gold medal in women's kabaddi for 100th medal

India beat Chinese Taipei 26-25 to win gold medal in women’s kabaddi on Saturday at the 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou. With the yellow metal, India’s tally increased to a historic 100 medals in China. This is India’s highest medal haul at the continental event with the previous best being 100 medals at the 2018 Asian Games in Indonesia.

India’s women’s kabaddi team have now won gold medal in three of the four editions that kabaddi has been part of the Asian Games programme. First introduced in 2010, India clinched the yellow metal in 2010 and 2014 with Iran triumphing in 2018. India had won with a silver medal at the 2018 Asian Games in Indonesia.

India started the match brightly and in attacking mode with eight points from raids and six as bonus points. Chinese Taipei also garnered eight points from outs but only one bonus point. At the interval, India led 14-9.

Chinese Taipei turned things around in the second half with a more attacking approach while India went into a defensive mode. The second part of the contest saw Chinese Taipei earn 16 points in comparison to India’s 12.

Chinese Taipei took 12 out points, 1 bonus point, two from inflicting all outs and one with a super tackle. India, in comparison, bagged just 10 out points and two with bonus points. However, it was just about enough for India to pull of a memorable, even if nervous, gold medal finish.

Earlier in the day, India had won four medals in archery with Jyothi Surekha Vennam and Ojas Deotale winning gold medals, silver for Abhishek Verma and bronze for Aditi Gopichand.