Sport - Shooting

Saeed Al Maktoum leads the field

JAIPUR: Saeed Al Maktoum of the United Arab Emirates led the field in skeet with 73 out of 75 in the Asian Clay shooting championship at the Jagatpura Range here on Wednesday.

The 31-year-old former Asian champion, who had won the title in New Delhi in 2003 with 148 out of 150 after a perfect 125 in the qualifying phase, shot very well on a warm and windy day to return scores of 25, 24 and 24.

The Kuwaitis and Qataris were closely behind Al Maktoum, as they breathed down his neck at 72. Abdulla Al Rashidi of Kuwait, the reigning Asian champion, started and ended the day with perfect rounds, but his record was blemished with a 22 in the second round. The Qataris, Rashid Ahamad and Nasser Al-Attiya also had rounds of 72 with the former having one perfect round while the latter shot consistent rounds of 24.

With four shooters at 71, it was not a bad performance from the National champion Mairaj Ahmad Khan to end the day with a 70. He wound up with a perfect round after below par efforts of 23 and 22 earlier, to figure ninth among 21 shooters. A good fare on Thursday in the last two rounds can see Mairaj make the final.

The other two Indians, Parampal Singh and Naveen Jindal shot 69 and 66 respectively. Parampal improved with rounds of 21, 24 and 24, while Naveen returned rounds of 24, 22 and 20.

Sania Shaikh was fourth among the women with 41 out of 50 after two rounds. Rashmee Rathore was seventh with 38. Sutiya Jiewchaloemmit of Thailand led with 47 and was followed by Ng Swee Theng of Singapore at 45 and Isarapa Imprasertsuk of Thailand with 43. The women will have one more round of qualification before the final on Thursday.

The Indian juniors looked good, with Man Singh (65), Sheeraz Sheikh (64) and Smit Singh (63) figuring in the top five among 10 shooters after three rounds. They look good to get the team gold at the least. Fawaz Alazemi of Kuwait led with 66 following rounds of 22.

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