Tokyo: On a much better day for India at the Tokyo Olympics, Deepika Kumari defeated American Jenniver Mucino-Fernandez 6-4 to sail into women’s individual recurve archery event Round of 16 on Wednesday. Earlier, Deepika defeated Karma of Bhutan to make it to the second round.
Not being able to do much in the mixed team event alongside Pravin Jadav, the onus was on World No.1 Deepika in the individual events and she delivered in style. The Indian started on a slower note hitting a 7 and two consecutive 9s to surrender the first game.
However, Deepika soon recovered hitting three perfect 10s in the next two rounds to take the lead 4-2 lead. Mucino-Fernandez took advantage of Deepika’s disappointing 6 in the fourth round but the Indian showed why she is the best in the business scoring a 26-25 in the final round to take the game home.
India’s @ImDeepikaK wins against Jennifer Mucino Fernandez of USA in a 6-4 thriller to qualify for the next round. Stay tuned for more updates.#Archery #Olympics #Cheer4India pic.twitter.com/FYxNc9Wh71
— SAI Media (@Media_SAI) July 28, 2021
Earlier, Deepika had a fantastic start to the morning with a dominant 6-0 win against Karma. Earlier, debutant Jadav and Tarundeep Rai made second-round exits in the men’s individual events.
Jadhav knocked out World No. 2 Galsan Bazarzhapov in his opening match before going down to world champion Brady Ellison of the USA in the second round. Rai went down to Itay Shanny of Israel in a tight shoot-off finish for a heartbreaking exit in his final Olympics appearance.
Like Jadav, Rai also made a winning start on the day with a thrilling come-from-behind 6-4 win over Oleksii Hunbin of Ukraine in the first round.
