Gold hopes turn to silver
JUWAIDI Mazuki suffered a double blow after settling for secondbest in both the men’s compound individual and mixed team events at the Archery Asia Cup in Bangkok yesterday.
With Khairul Anuar Mohamad also suffering a defeat in the men’s recurve individual final, it was a day of missed opportunities for the national archers in accruing three silver medals.
Juwaidi had a chance of a rare double victory but started the day in agonising fashion when he lost the individual final by the narrowest of margins, 147-146, to Iran’s Esmaeil Ebadi.
A bronze medallist in this tournament last year, Juwaidi was always playing catch-up to Ebadi after falling a point behind at the conclusion of the second end.
Ebadi matched Juwaidi’s score point-for-point for the remaining nine arrows to maintain his advantage to the end.
Juwaidi, however, had a shot at redemption in the mixed team event when he resumed his Sea Games gold medal-winning partnership with Fatin Nurfatehah Mat Salleh.
Juwaidi and Fatin trounced Bangladesh 156-141 in the first round, downed Vietnam 148-144 in the quarter-finals before edging Russia 150-149 to book a spot in the final.
But the Malaysian pair paid for a poor start in the final after failing four points behind at the halfway stage and could not bridge the gap to Taiwan’s Chen Hsiang-Hsuan and Wu Ting-Ting, who won 152-150.
Two-time Olympian Khairul was denied victory in the recurve final by Taiwan’s Deng Yu-Cheng 6-2.
Khairul, seeking to win the Asia Cup for the first time, lost the first two sets 29-27 and 28-27 after struggling to find his range.
But three consecutive 10s helped seal a 30-26 win in the third set, only for Deng to respond with the same series in the match-clinching fourth set, 3029.
Khairul was back in action in the recurve mixed team event with Nur Afisa Abdul Halil but they were eliminated by Kazakhstan 60 in the quarter-finals after beating Iran 6-2 in the first round.
In the shootout for the men’s compound individual bronze, Russian Alexander Dambaev downed Malaysian M. Khambeswaran 10-9 in a tie-break after the match ended 143-143.
The competition concludes today with the men’s and women’s team events in both the compound and recurve disciplines. Devinder Singh