New Delhi, Could 18 (IANS) Seasoned archers Deepika Kumari and Atanu Das did not make it to the Indian males’s and girls’s squads for the upcoming Asian Video games in Japan because the Archery Affiliation of India (AAI) opted for Dhiraj Bommadevara, Ankita Bhakat, and Jyothi Surekha Vennam as a part of the sturdy and youthful groups.
Deepika, who led India to the gold medal within the Shanghai World Cup just a few days again, and Atanu have been picked for the subsequent two World Cup Phases however couldn’t make it to the all-important 2026 Asian Video games, which might be held in Aichi Prefecture and Nagoya, Japan, from September 19 to October 4. Each Deepika and Atanu fopurth within the trials carried out by the federation and thus misplaced out on the Asian Video games.
Dhiraj Bommadevara, who received a silver within the Workforce Championship within the 2022 Hangzhou Asian Video games, teenager Neeraj Chouhan, and Yashdeep Bhoge will comprise the Indian males’s recurve group for the Asian Video games. Whereas Bommadevara is kind of skilled collaborating in his second successive Asian Video games, Chouhan is in nice type, having set a brand new nationwide document within the Males’s Recurve occasion by scoring 692/720 on the Nationwide Archery Championships, surpassing Olympian Tarundeep Rai’s earlier document. Bhoge received gold for India on the Asian Archery Championship in 2025.
Within the ladies’s recurve part, teenager Kumkum Anil Mohod, Kirti Sharma, and Ankita Bhakat, the 27-year-old archer from Kolkata, have been a part of the Indian group that received a bronze medal within the Workforce Competitors within the Hangzhou Asian Video games 2022.
Kumkum and Ankita, together with Deepika, have been a part of the Indian group that received a historic gold medal within the ladies’s group competitors on the Archery World Cup Stage 2 in Shanghai earlier this month, upsetting house favorite China within the last.
Deepika Kumari, Kumkum Anil Mohod, and Ankita Bhakat had already defeated 10-time Olympic gold-medal-winning nation Korea earlier within the week, 5-1 – the margin of victory nearly as shocking because the end result itself.
There have been a few surprises within the compound archery group with the skilled Ojas Deotale and Abhishek Verma, who received gold and silver, respectively, within the Hangzhou Asian Video games, lacking out and choosing Sahil Jadhav, Kushal Dalal, and Thirumuru Ganesh Mani Ratnam to make up the lads’s group. One other main omission was defending Asian Video games champion Ojas Deotale, who completed fifth within the choice trials.
World No. 3 Jyothi Surekha Vennam will spearhead the ladies’s compound group after her triple-medal haul on the 2023 Asian Video games, the place she received gold within the particular person, group, and combined occasions. She may have Chikitha Taniparthi and Prithika Pradeep as her teammates on the Asian Video games.
India had bagged 9 medals — 5 gold, two silver, and two bronze medals — in archery on the Hangzhou Asian Video games.
The chosen squad can even signify India at World Cup Phases 3 and 4, scheduled in Antalya, Turkiye, in June and Madrid, Spain, in July, respectively.
Indian squad for Asian Video games:
Recurve males: Dhiraj Bommadevara, Neeraj Chauhan, Yashdeep Bhoge.
Recurve ladies: Kirti Sharma, Kumkum Anil Mohod, Ankita Bhakat.
Compound males: Sahil Jadhav, Kushal Dalal, Thirumuru Ganesh Mani Ratnam.
Compound ladies: Jyothi Surekha Vennam, Chikitha Taniparthi, Prithika Pradeep.
–IANS
bsk/