Women grapplers to fight for bronze in Asian C’ship

New Delhi: Asian Games medallist Alka Tomar, along with five other women grapplers, will fight it out for a bronze after falling out of contention for gold and silver at the Senior Asian Wrestling Championship here on Friday.

Tomar (59kg), the 2006 Asian Games bronze medallist, made an impressive start to her campaign by registering a 8-0 victory in straight periods over Thailand’s Wailaiwan Thongkam but lost her semifinal bout to Chinese Liu Fengming. She now gets a shot at bronze through the Repechage round when she battles Kazakhstan’s Miruyert Dynbayeva. Nirmala Devi, who lost in the first round to eventual finalist Zhao Shasha of China in the 48kg Freestyle category, will contest the Repechage round against Sim-Hyang So of People’s Republic of Korea. In 51kg, Babita Kumari will grapple with Japan’s Hiromi Sakurai. Babita lost to Kazakhstan’s Zhuldyz Eshimova Turtbayeva in the first round. Suman Kundu (63kg), Geetika Jakhar (67kg) and Anmol (72kg) will also get a chance to secure bronze in their respective bouts tomorrow evening. On Thursday, in the men’s section, Olympic bronze medalist Sushil Kumar bagged a gold in the 66kg freestyle. Sushil, also a four-time Commonwealth Championship gold medallist, beat Kim Dae Sung of Korea in straight periods 4-0, 2-0 at the Indira Gandhi Indoor Sports Complex. PTI