Udit endured a heart-breaking moment to settle for the men’s freestyle 57kg silver medal as India gathered one silver and two bronze medals on the opening day of the Asian wrestling championships at Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, on Thursday.
Udit, an Asian under-20 champion, performed well to get past Iran’s Ebrahim Mahdi Khari 10-8, Kyrgyzstan’s Almaz Smanbekov 6-4 and North Korea’s Kim Kum Hyok 4-3 to meet Japan’s Kento Yumiya in the final.
In the closely-fought title clash, Udit trailed 3-4 before levelling the scores and leading the bout on criteria. He defended well in the closing minute until Yumiya managed to get a hold of the Indian’s right leg and effected a push-out in the final second to score a 5-4 win.
The overjoyed Yumiya could not stop his tears, while a shocked Udit left the arena in utter disbelief.
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India had secured four consecutive gold medals from 2020 to 2023 in this weight.
Abhimanyu fetched India’s second medal in 70kg. After beating Korea’s Lee Seungchul 10-0, he lost to Japan’s Yoshinosuke Aoyagi in the semifinals 10-0. The Indian rallied from 0-3 in the first period to record a 6-5 victory over Uzbekistan’s Begijon Kuldashev in the bronze medal match.
Vicky (97kg) defeated China’s Tuerxunbieke Muheite 9-6 but went down against Kazakhstan’s Rizabek Aitmukhan 13-0 in the semifinals. In the bronze medal fight against local wrestler Andrei Aronov, Vicky posted a 10-1 win to secure India’s third medal.
In 65kg, Rohit beat Tajikistan’s Kamol Begakov and Kazakhstan’s Sanzhar Mukhtar ‘by fall’ before losing to Mongolia’s Asian Games champion Tulga Tumur Ochir 7-0 in the semifinals. He was beaten 5-3 by Japanese Masanosuke Ono in the bronze medal match.
Parvinder Singh (79kg) lost to Japan’s Ryunosuke Kamiya 3-0 to crash out early.
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