India’s Greco-Roman wrestlers win 3 bronze medals on opening day of Asian Championship

Ulaanbaatar (Mongolia), Apr 19

On a memorable day for India at the Asian Wrestling Championships, three of the five Greco-Roman grapplers in action, including Sunil Kumar, won bronze medals here today.

This is the second time that Kumar has earned a podium finish at the Championships, having won the 87kg category title in the 2020 edition.

The 23-year-old opened up a huge 5-0 lead early in his bronze medal bout against Mongolia’s Batbayar Lutbayar and eventually won by technical superiority.

This was after he lost the semifinals by technical superiority to Uzbekistan’s Jalgasbay Berdimuratov. He had started with a 5-3 win over Japan’s Masato Sumi.

In the 55kg class, Arjun Halakurki defeated Davaabandi Munkh Erdene 10-7 in the bronze playoff. He had lost his quarterfinals clash to Kazakhstan’s Amangali Bekbolatov. Halakurki had also won a bronze at the 2020 edition of the event.

In the 63kg category, Neeraj got the better of Uzbekistan’s Islomjon Bakhramov 7-4 to earn a podium finish.

He had reached the playoffs after losing his quarters match to eventual champion Tynar Sharshenbekov from Kyrgyzstan.

However, Sajan Bhanwal missed out on a bronze losing to Japan’s Kodai Sakuraba in the 77kg category. Prem Kumar bowed out after losing his opening 130kg class qualification bout 0-5. —