Glasgow: India’s golden boy Abhinav Bindra finished off his Commonwealth Games journey with his maiden singles gold medal while his compatriot Ravi Kumar unfortunately missed out on a bronze medal in a shoot-off in the final of the men’s 10-metre air rifle event at the Barry Buddon Shooting Centre here Friday.
Bindra and Ravi were engaged in an interesting duel during the final round. Ravi was in lead after 12 shots but Bindra took over him in the 13th shot and then raced away to seal the gold medal in style.
For Bindra, who won India’s only individual Olympic gold medal in Beijing, it was his first individual gold medal in his fifth and last Commonwealth Games here. On the eve of the event, Bindra, 31, had announced that this would be his last Commonwealth Games.
The gold medal was the second medal for India from the shooting ranges after 16-year-old Malaika Goel won the sliver in the women’s 10m air pistol event.
Bindra, who was the youngest participant at the 1998 Commonwealth Games, shot 205.3 in the final to clinch his fourth Commonwealth Gold medal. His previous three gold medals were in pairs. He had won singles silver medals in 2002 and 2010 and bronze in 2006.
The Olympic champion shot 205.3 in a keenly contested final round that saw three shoot-off. Bindra also had a good qualifying round where he finished third with 622.2 points.
The silver went to Bangladesh’s Abdullah Baki while England’s Daniel Rivers got the bronze. Both Baki and Rivers were tied for the second position after the eighth shot but Baki won the shoot-off.
Baki finished with a score of 202.1 and was fifth in the qualifying rounds with a score of 620. Rivers topped the qualifying rounds with a score of shot 623.6, which was a Games Record and got 182.4 in the final.
Rivers and India’s Ravi Kumar were also tied for the third place but the Englishman clinched the shoot-off. Ravi shot 162.4 in the final.
Earlier, India’s first medal from the shooting ranges in the 2014 Commonwealth Games came from 16-year-old Malaika Goel, who shot down a silver in the women’s 10m air pistol event, while her role model and former World No. 1 Heena Sidhu ended up a disappointing seventh at the Barry Buddon Shooting Centre here Friday.
World No. 15 Malaika bagged the silver with a total of 197.1 points while the gold was clinched by unfancied Singaporean shooter Shun Xie Teo with a score of 198.6. The bronze went to Dorothy Ludwig of Canada with 177.2 points.
Both Heena, World No. 4, and Malaika were the highest ranked shooters in the competition and expectations were high from them. Heena had won the silver in the 2010 edition in Delhi.
Malaika displayed raw talent and held her nerves to shoot her maiden Commonwealth Games medal. She finished fourth in the qualifying round while Heena faltered badly in the final round with a score of 95.8 and was eliminated after the fourth shot, despite topping the qualification round.
Malaika hails from the industrial town of Ludhiana in Punjab and broke into the top-15 in the world at the age of 16. Her best so far has been World No. 13 in May.
Malaika, who is supported by Olympic Gold Quest, picked up the sport in 2008 when the country was celebrating its first individual Olympic medal, thanks to rifle shooter Abhinav Bindra’s exploits in Beijing in the 10m air rifle event. Bindra and Heena are Malaika’s role models.
Meanwhile, the Indian men’s hockey team Friday began their Commonwealth Games campaign with a facile 3-1 win over lowly Wales in a Pool A tie at the Glasgow National Hockey Centre here.
In what was a lazy and lacklustre beginning, World No. 9 India at half-time were held to a 1-1 scoreline by Wales, who are ranked 22 places below. But a much better second half performance that saw two goals being scored put India through.
V.R. Raghunath opened the scoring for India from a penalty corner in the 20th minute. But his opener was cancelled out just three minutes later by a stinging shot from Andrew Cornick.
It was another penalty corner post-break that gave India the lead for the second time in the match. Rupinder Pal Singh was at hand in 42nd minute to turn the ball into the back of the net.
Gurwinder Singh Chandi put the match beyond Wales in the 47th minute from India’s first open-play goal in the match.
“Our aim was to score more goals against Wales as per our strategy but some small mistakes didn’t allow us to achieve it. Whatever shortcomings we have seen will be rectified and not repeated against Scotland,” India chief coach Terry Walsh said.
“The team is in good shape and motivated after today’s win to take on the opponents and steal the show with even better results in the second game.”
India will next take on hosts Scotland Saturday.
Meanwhile, Indian men’s and women’s table tennis teams notched up wins in their respective pool matches of the 20th Commonwealth Games being held at the Scotstoun Sports Campus here Friday.
While the men defeated Guyana 3-0 in Pool C, the women thrashed Kenya with the same scoreline in Pool D.
In the men’s first match, the pair of Sanil Shankar Shetty and A. Anthony Amalraj defeated Paul David and Christopher Franklin 11-8, 11-6, 11-5 followed by Soumyajit Ghosh’s 11-8, 11-5, 11-9 victory over Franklin in the first men’s singles to wrap up the match.
Amalraj totally demolished Shamar Britton 11-4, 11-3, 11-3 in the dead rubber to make it 3-0 in India’s favour.
Meanwhile, the Indian women’s doubles pair of Ankita Das and Poulomi Ghatak drubbed Della Mgenya Njani and Sejan Dipan Thakkar 11-6, 11-5, 11-5.
Manika Batra defeated Sejal 11-7, 11-4, 11-4 to give India a 2-0 unassailable lead which was increased further to 3-0 when Poulomi thrashed Jinita Azad Kumar Shah 11-4, 11-3, 11-5.
