Deepika makes it to the round of 32 in Archery World Cup Asian Youth Games: Another over-age lifter disqualified

Deepika Kumari got back into rhythm and kept India's medal hopes alive advancing into the round of 32 in the recurve individual section at the Archery World Cup Stage 4 in Wroclaw, Poland on Wednesday.

According to information received here, Deepika was the sole survivor in the women's individual section as veteran Dola Banerjee, Lashram Bombayla Devi and Rimil Buriuly made early exits.

Having got the first round bye, Deepika faced a stiff challenge from American Michelle Gilbert before wrapping the issue in the tie-breaker with a 6-5 margin.

The 18-year-old will battle it out against Carina Christiansen of Denmark for a place in the pre-quarterfinals today.

In the recurve men individual, Tarundeep Rai, Atanu Das and rookie Priyank kept the hopes alive advancing into the second round. Pitted against an experienced Jayant Talukdar, Das never gave the Olympian archer any chance with a 6-0 win. Priyank ousted Arshak Petrosyan of Armenia 6-0, while Rai defeated Karlis Akots Gribulis of Latvia by an identical margin. Adding to embarrassment for the country, another Indian weightlifter was on Wednesday disqualified from the Youth Asian Games in Nanjing due to overage, taking the total number of such athletes to 25.

Manpreet Kaur (women's 63kg) became the fourth Indian weightlifter to be disqualified as she was found to be above 17 years of age. The participants in athletics and weightlifting in the Youth Asian Games have to be born between January 1, 1997 and January 1, 1999. Her date of birth is January 1996.

Earlier, the entries of three weightlifters -- Chandrika Tarafdar (Women's 48kg), Jyoti Mal (women's 53kg) and Akshay Bhagwan (Men's 62kg) -- were rejected by the Nanjing Games organisers due to overage issue. All the three were born in 1996. A top Indian Weightlifting Federation official blamed the fiasco to the confusion caused by India's ban by the International Olympic Committee.