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Manu Bhakar qualified for the women’s 25m pistol final to boost hopes of an unprecedented third medal in the Paris Olympics as Lakshya Sen became the first Indian shuttler to reach the semi-finals of the men’s singles event. read more
 "Bhaker inches closer to third medal as Lakshya, men’s hockey team register historic wins")
India's Lakshya Sen celebrates after defeating Chinese Taipei's Chou Tien-chen 19-21, 21-15, 21-12 in the badminton men's singles quarter-finals in the Paris Olympics on Friday, 2 August. Reuters
Shooter Manu Bhaker inched closer to an unprecedented third medal in the Paris Olympics on Friday while Lakshya Sen made history by becoming the first Indian shuttler to reach the Olympic men’s singles semi-finals.
Paris Olympics: News, schedule, medals tally and more
What made the seventh day of competitions in the Paris Games even sweeter for the Indian contingent was the men’s hockey team led by Harmanpreet Singh beating Australia in the Olympics for the first time in 52 years with a thrilling 3-2 victory.
Also making history was the pair of mixed team pair of Ankita Bhakat and Dhiraj Bommadevara, who became the first Indian archers to reach the semi-finals in any category at the Olympics.
As It Happened | India at 2024 Paris Olympics, Day 7
Bhakat and Bommadevara achieved the feat by defeating Spain in the quarter-finals, but narrowly missed out on a medal with back-to-back defeats against South Korea and USA, the former going on to win gold.
It was a happy day out for Indian athletes after Day 6 witnessed multiple heartbreaks, with several medal contenders including the badminton men’s doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty, boxer Nikhat Zareen and shooter Sift Kaur Samra crash out of the Paris Games.
Bhaker, Sen keep the Indian flag flying high
Neither Bhaker nor Sen has put a wrong foot forward so far, with Bhaker reaching the final in each of the three events that she is part of and Sen winning each of his five matches so far.
Earlier this week, Bhaker won bronze in the women’s individual and mixed team categories of the 10m air pistol event, partnering with Sarabjot Singh in the latter. It was no different in the 25m pistol event either as she qualified for the final by finishing second with a score of 590, behind Hungary’s Veronika Major.
Esha Singh was the other Indian shooter in the qualification round but she finished at the 18th spot with a score of 581 and bowed out.
Bhaker will be in action in the final on Saturday afternoon and will be hoping to change the colour of her medal. If she secures another podium finish, 22-year-old shooter from Jhajjar, Haryana, will become the first Indian athlete to win three Olympic medals, going past wrestler Sushil Kumar and shuttler PV Sindhu — both of whom have two each, albeit in different editions.
Bhaker will also have her eyes set on joining fellow shooter Abhinav Bindra and javelin star Neeraj Chopra in the elite club of Indian athletes with individual Olympic gold medals.
Sen, meanwhile, has gone where no Indian male shuttler has ever gone before, defeating Chinese Taipei’s Chou Tien-chen in a three-game thriller to reach the men’s singles semi-finals. The 22-year-old from Almora had conceded the first game to Chou, but bounced back in style in Games 2 and 3 to keep India’s flag flying high in badminton.
Read | Who is Lakshya Sen, the last remaining Indian shuttler in Paris 2024?
He faces reigning Olympic champion and two-time world champion Viktor Axelsen of Denmark in the semi-finals on Sunday. Axelsen, who had also won bronze in the 2016 Rio Olympics besides gold in Tokyo, defeated Singapore’s Loh Kean Yew 21-9, 21-17 in their quarter-final meeting shortly after Sen’s victory.
Sen had earlier become the third Indian male shuttler after Parupalli Kashyap (London 2012) and Kidambi Srikanth (Rio 2016) to reach the men’s singles quarter-finals in the Olympics.
And with key medal hopes Satwik-Chirag and Sindhu crashing out of the Paris Games on Thursday, Sen remains India’s last hope of collecting at least one badminton medal in the Olympics for the fourth consecutive edition.
India defeat Australia in men’s hockey after five decades
Just as historic was the Indian men’s hockey team defeating Australia in the Olympics for the first time since the 1972 Games in Munich, beating them 3-2 in their final Pool B match on Friday. It was a margin similar to what the Indians had inflicted on their trans-Tasman neighbours New Zealand in their opening game of the Paris campaign.
The Indians, who had won bronze in the Tokyo Olympics, bounced back from their 1-2 loss against Belgium on the previous day. Abhishek (12’) broke the deadlock once again as he opened India’s account with a goal in the first quarter.
The day, however, belonged to skipper Harmanpreet Singh (13th, 33rd), who fired a brace to put the his team in the driving seat. While first goal came off a superb drag flick from a penalty corner, Harmanpreet made the most of a penalty stroke that had been awarded to him.
For the Aussies, Tom Craig had narrowed the deficit five minutes before the half-time hooter went off, while Blake Govers made things all the more interesting by scoring five minutes before full-time.
The Indians, however, defended resolutely to deny the Kookaburras an equaliser, and thus beat them in an Olympic match played on AstroTurf for the first time ever.
India finished at the second spot in Pool B as a result of their victory over Australia and face Great Britain in the quarter-finals in what will be a repeat of their showdown at the same stage of the tournament in Tokyo three years ago.
India had won that encounter 3-1 to advance to the semi-finals, where they would suffer a 2-5 loss against Belgium before beating Germany 5-4 in the bronze medal playoff.
Bhakat and Bommadevara miss out on a historic medal
Bhakat and Bommadevara, meanwhile, became the first Indians to reach the semi-finals of any archery event at the Olympics after defeating Spain’s Elia Canales and Pablo Acha Gonzalez 5-3 in the mixed team quater-finals at Les Invalides. This was after they had beaten Indonesia’s Diananda Choirunisa and Arif Pangestu 5-1 in the pre-quarters.
The Indian pair then had one foot in the final after winning the first set against South Korea’s Lim Si-hyeon and Kim Woojin 38-36. The Koreans, who later defeated Germany 6-0 to win gold, would roar back in style to win the next three sets in a row to complete a 6-2 victory.
USA’s Casey Kaufhold and Brady Ellison would then defeat the Indian pair by a similar margin, going 4-0 up initially before stifling an Indian fighting by landing the knockout punch in Set 4, to deny India what would have been their first ever archery medal at the Olympics.
Indians disappoint in athletics for second day running
The Indian athletics contingent had another disappointing outing on Friday with distance runners Parul Chaudhary and Ankita Dhyani and shot-putter Tajinder Pal Singh Toor failing to advance to the finals of their respective events.
Chaudhary (15:10.68) and Dhyani (16:19.38) finished 20th and 14th respectively in Heat 2 and Heat 1 respectively in the women’s 5000m event, the former posting her season best score.
Toor, meanwhile, covered a distance of 18.05m in his only legal throw in three attempts that was nowhere close to the qualifying mark of 21.35m, and was also the poorest among the 29 competitiors with at least one legal throw.
Meanwhile in golf, Shubhankar Sharma and Gaganjeet Bhullar produced an improved display in Round 2 of the men’s individual stroke play event. Sharma and Bhullar jumped four places each to currently sit at tied-25th and tied-52nd respectively.
And in sailing, Nethra Kumanan slipped to 11th in the overall standings after finishing 15th and 27th in Rounds 2 and 3 respectively.
In rowing, Balraj Panwar secured a fifth-place finish in men’s single sculls Final D to finish 23rd overall.
It was also the end of the road for judoka Tulika Maan, who bowed out with a 0-10 loss against Cuba’s Idalys Ortiz.
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English (US) ·