Jakarta: Dark horse Manjit Singh came from nowhere to snatch the men’s 800m gold for the biggest medal of his life but finals continued to be a riddle for P.V. Sindhu, taking some sheen off her historic silver at the 18th Asian Games, on Tuesday.
Unexpected haul of a silver and a bronze in Kurash, an indigenous central asian form of wrestling, added to the tally, along with a silver in the debut event of mixed 4x400m relay in athletics.
The Indian quartet of Mohd. Anas, M.R. Poovamma, Hima Das and Arokia Rajiv clocked 3 minute and 15.71 seconds, while Bahrain ran away with the gold in 3:11.89. Kazakhstan took the bronze in 3:19.52.
With Tuesday’s performance, India rose a rung to eighth in the overall standings with a total of 50 medals, nine of them gold, 19 silver and 22 bronze. The country is now just seven short of matching the 2014 tally.
The 31-year-old Manjit, an unheralded runner from Haryana who doesn’t even have a national gold to his credit, chose Asian Games to find the limelight.
This post was published on August 29, 2018 5:17 pm