Anirudh Kumar (125kg) used to be the lone medalist for India on Friday as Tokyo Olympian Deepak Punia failed to succeed in the medal spherical at the last day of the Asian Championships in Astana on Friday. Anirudh beat Uzbekistan’s Sardorbek Kholmatov on technical superiority (12-2) to say his maiden Seniors world medal.
The 21-year-old started his marketing campaign with a dominant 8-2 win over Japan’s Taiki Yamamoto ahead of dropping the quarter-final through fall (2-0) to Kazakhstan’s Yusup Batirmurzaev in 31 seconds. In the bronze medal playoff in opposition to Kholmatov, Anirudh used to be at his dominant absolute best, ultimate out the competition with 30 seconds last within the first duration.
A manufactured from the town’s Chhatrasal Stadium the place he has been staying for a decade now, Anirudh hails from Sonipat’s Purkhas village. He gained the cadet Asian and Worlds bronze in 2019 and secured any other third-place end on the Junior World Championships in 2021.
“He is a well-rounded wrestler, but still a work in progress. We are still working on some technical areas and if he is able to learn, you’ll see him win a lot of international medals in near future,” Lalit Kumar , head trainer at Chhatrasal Stadium, mentioned.
Anirudh used to be a few of the high contenders to constitute India eventually yr’s Commonwealth Games however used to be pegged again through a decrease again harm all the way through the rigors. Instead, Mohit Grewal went to Birmingham and got here house with a bronze medal.
The decrease again harm stored Anirudh out of motion for 2 months. He marked his go back to festival with a Nationals bronze in December and shortly injured his shoulder.
“Anirudh is quite injury-prone. In heavier weights, you can get injured really badly, so that is one area he needs to guard against,” Lalit added.
Meanwhile, four-time Asian Championships medalist Deepak Punia drew a clean within the 92kg department. The 23-year-old beat China’s Xiao Sun 8-1 in his opening bout however misplaced to Bahrain’s Magomed Sharipov 5-0.
This used to be Punia’s first festival since his Commonwealth Games gold and the military guy from Haryana had moved up a weight elegance from his standard 86kg. He had most effective just lately recovered from an Ulnar Collateral Ligament (UCL) harm to his proper elbow that he sustained at a coaching camp in Michigan simply days after profitable his CWG gold.
The harm compelled him to skip the World Championships that adopted and stored him from mat coaching till every week ahead of the Asian Championships.
“Deepak appeared quite subdued in his attacks. He was possibly worried about his elbow,” Lalit mentioned.
Among different Indians in motion, Pankaj misplaced his quarter-final bout within the 61kg elegance whilst Jointy Kumar went down on the identical level within the 86kg department. Aman Sehrawat (57kg) stays the lone Indian gold medalist within the festival whilst Antim Panghal (53kg), Nisha Dahiya (68kg) and Rupin (GR 55 kg) reached the finals of their respective weight divisions.