Wednesday, Oct 09, 2002
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Asian Games
By A. Vinod
The turn of events today followed the same course as of the past five days and the team coach, Sunny Thomas, visibly shaken, was hard pressed for words as he made an attempt to sum up the reasons behind the disgusting show. ``Obviously, there are no excuses. It is true that it was always going to be a difficult campaign but that is something which we were all well aware of even before we arrived here. There was that element of bad luck as far as Anjali was concerned but, I think, our shooters lost the battle thinking too much of their Chinese and South Korean rivals rather than concentrating to perform to their known potential."
Rana fails
What again characterised the poor display by the Indians was the failure of Jaspal Rana to deliver in the standard pistol competitions today. Like in the centre-pistol event on Monday, the ace shooter was once more seen to struggle to find his touch before finishing joint 12th, alongside Dilshod Mukhtarov of Uzbekistan, with a total of 568. A repeat show of the Manchester effort where he had shot 576 would have put the 26-year-old in contention of at least a medal in a shoot-off with three of his rivals this morning. But all that should now remain in the realm of conjecture as Rana after a good start slided badly out of the picture. What, actually, spoiled his chances straightaway was the 45 (with five 9s) in the second sequence of the 150-second opening round. It was least expected as Rana had opened up with a brilliant 50, with almost all the five shots hitting at the same spot. The away tide could be hardly controlled, though the former World junior champion did finish the first detail with a score of 190 with scores of 47 and 48 in the third and fourth sequences. It got all the more worse in the 20-second second round where in Rana had an aggregate of only 189 with scores of 47, 46, 48 and 48 through the four rotations. The expected change in fortunes in the 10-second final round also never came about as Rana could pile up only another 189, a much below par effort when compared with his own previous scores. He had three identical sequences of 48 herein before complaining of a loose barrel. But then, even after the barrel was rectified, all he could achieve was a poor 45 in the last detail. Worse still was the performances by Ved Prakash and Samresh Jung, who made up the Indian team with Rana for the event. The bespectacled Jung had the best score among the Indians in the initial round as he returned with a total of 194, made up from the scores of 49, 50, 49, 46 through the four legs. In the 20-second round, he again had a decent score of 189 (47, 48, 47, 47) but lost all his chances in the third round when he cracked his first shot even before the target came into view. Jung, unlucky thus to manage just 36 from that sequence, had only a poor total of 168 from the last round before finishing 36th in a field of 44. Ved Prakash was placed 19th with a total of 561, also performing well below his known potential, that came from his scores of 192 in the first round, 188 in the second and 181 in the third and final round. The poor scores of the trio also affected India's chances badly in the team event, where it was eventually placed seventh with a total of 1680. China was the winner of the gold with a total of 1724, just three points more than second-placed South Korea. The bronze went to North Korea which had a total of 1712. The Chinese aspirations of a second gold in the event, however, was shot down by Thailand's Opas Reungpanyawat who had the day's best card of 579, which incidentally was also an improvement over the existing Asian record. The silver was grabbed by China's Liu Guohui, while the bronze went in favour of South Korean Park Byung-Taek who was involved in a three-way shoot off with his own team-mate, Kim Sung-Jun and China's Liu Yadong.
Qatar sets record
At the nearby skeet range, the Indians were nowhere in the picture finishing eighth in the team event, won by Qatar with a new Asian record to boot. The lone satisfaction for the Indians here was that they finished ahead of Pakistan. The Indians had a total of 319 after Rahul Rai, Harinder Singh Bedi and Naveen Jindal had another disappointing round. Individually, Rahul (109) was placed 25th and Bedi (107) and Jindal (103) at the 27th and 29th postiions. Masoud Hamad though tied with China's Jin Di with 122 made it a clean sweep for Qatar when the count-back of the last round scores was applied. Masoud had shot 24 and Di 23 in the final round. Qatar also gained the bronze through Nasser Al-Attiya who had a card of 121. The results: Men: 25m standard pistol: 1. Opas Ruengpanyawut (Tha), 579, 2. Liu Guohui (Chn), 577, 3. Park Byung-Taek (Kor), 576. 12th: Jaspal Rana, 568; 19th: Ved Prakash, 561, 36th: Samresh Jung, 551. Team: 1. China, 1724, 2. South Korea, 1721, 3. North Korea, 1712. 7. India, 1680. Skeet: 1. Masoud Hamad (Qat), 122, 2. Jin Di (Chn), 122, 3. Nasser Al-Attiya (Qat), 121. 25th: Rahul Rai (21+22+23+22+21 =109), 27th: Harinder Singh Bedi (20+22+22+21+22=107), 3. Naveen Jindal (22+23+20+18+20=103). Team: 1. Qatar, 360, 2. Kazakhstan, 355, 3. China, 352. 6th India, 319.
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