Indian juniors fail to make it big at World Championship

New Delhi: India finished the Junior World Championship in Pattaya, Thailand on a rather low note with its grapplers just about managing to bag a couple of bronze medals from the six-day long event.

Indu Chaudhary opened India`s account with a bronze in the 44kg weight category in the female section, but after that only Pradeep managed a medal, in the boy`s segment. Pradeep (50kg) started with a loss in the freestyle category before clawing his way back in the repechage round to win India its second bronze from the championship. The 21-year-old was no match for Ruslan Surkhayev, losing the first period 0-1 and then succumbing 2-6 in the next, to hand his Azerbaijan opponent a comfortable victory. However, Surkhayev`s charge to the finals gave Pradeep a chance to compete in the repechage round and the Indian grappler made full use to finish in the medals column. Pradeep beat Germany`s Marc Luithle 3-0 before overcoming Muammer Sancak of Turkey in the bronze medal bout. After clinching the first period on a level score of 1-1, the Indian toiled to take the next one 4-3 and eke out a win. It was, however, heartbreak for Baliram Yadav in the 55kg freestyle category as he lost his bronze medal bout 0-3 to Manuel Wolfer, this after registering successive victories against Guk-Hyeon Kim of Korea and Ukraine`s Vitaliy Hurskyy. Yadav started off on a positive note, beating Andry Jose Davila Baron of Vietnam 3-1, but could not go past Mongolia`s Bekhbayar Edrenebat in the next round. The only other notable contribution in the freestyle category came in 60kg, with Bajrang making it to the quarterfinals before going down to Armenia`s Valodya Frangulyan. Earlier, in the girls category, Indu was the only grappler to clinch a medal after she beat Evin Demirhan of Turkey 3-1 in a closely contested repechage round bout. It was, however, a big disappointment for Indian boys in the Greco-Roman segment as they failed to make an impression in the tournament. PTI