India’s Aditi Gopichand Swami and Ojas Pravin Deotale clinched gold medals in the women’s and men’s individual compound events, as Jyothi Vennam bagged bronze. (Credit: Twitter)
A calm and composed Deotale, who hails from Nagpur in Maharashtra, defeated Lukasz Przybylski of Poland by one point in a thrilling finish en route to the men’s title.
Ojas Deotale also became the world champion when he bagged the compound men’s title with a sheer perfect score of 150 as India recorded their best-ever finish in the showpiece with four medals — three gold and one bronze.
A calm and composed Deotale, who hails from Nagpur in Maharashtra, defeated Lukasz Przybylski of Poland by one point in a thrilling finish en route to the men’s title.
Deotale emerged victorious in the men’s individual compound event. Ojas beat Poland’s Lukasz Przybylski 150-149 in a tightly fought final to become the first Indian male archer to win a gold medal at the world championships.
In an end-to-end shooting, both Deotale and his Polish rival were locked 90-all after three ends (nine arrows).
Deotale continued his perfect 10-hitting spree and made it 150 out of 150 as Przybylski crumbled under pressure and dropped a point to settle for the silver.
“It’s no fluke and a result of strong teamwork, focus on sports science and 100 per cent faith in our technical team,” Archery Association of India secretary general Pramod Chandurkar told.
The 21-year-old Ojas had earlier beaten Dutch archer Mike Schloesser, a former world champion, and Poland’s Przemyslaw Konecki in the semis and quarters, respectively.
And with this, India’s campaign at the World Archery Championships 2023 in Berlin, which is the first Paris 2024 Olympic qualifier event for archers, came to an end on Saturday, as they finished the meet with four medals — three gold and one bronze. All the medals were won by the compound archers.
None of the Indian recurve archers made the medal rounds, thereby failing to win any Olympic quota places for the Paris 2024 Olympics on offer in Berlin. Only recurve archery competitions are held at the Olympics.
(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed – IANS)
