The Hindu : Sport : Vijay and Tamang justify their billing

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Mar 20, 2006

Sport

Sport

Vijay and Tamang justify their billing

MELBOURNE: Favourites Pemba Tamang and Vijay Kumar lived up to their reputation, clinching one more gold for India, but Olympic silver medallist Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore and Vikram Bhatnagar had to settle for a silver in the double trap pairs event of the shooting competition at the Commonwealth Games here on Sunday.

India figured in four of the five events this morning and finished with one gold and two silvers, apart from a fourth place in the women's 10m air pistol pairs section.

Anjali Bhagwat and Anuja Jung bagged the silver in the women's 50m rifle three position pairs, while Sonia Rana and Harveen Srao finished fourth in the air pistol pairs.

Though the performance of the Indians has been satisfactory so far, Sunday's showing was not that impressive as the country had won three golds and a silver in these four events in the 2002 Manchester Games.

Tamang, who had displayed good form and performed well in the badge competition just before the tournament, was in his element as he combined well with Vijay to take the gold medal.

Australians take silver

They totalled 1134, 19 points below the Games record, but it was enough for the gold. The Australian pair of David Chapman and Bruce Favell were far behind the Indians as they aggregated 1116 for the silver, while Metodi Igorov and Yuri Movshovich of Canada claimed the bronze with 1111.

Vijay started well as he fired 98, 94 and 98 in his first series and then came up with a series of 95, 95 and 91 to finish with 571 out of 600.

Tamang began with a 96 in his first series but his next two rounds were 93 and 92. The Army shooter's second series had scores of 95, 94, 93 for an overall total of 563/600.

In the much anticipated men's double trap event, featuring Athens Olympics silver medallist Rathore and Bhatnagar, turned out to be disappointing as the fancied pair failed to retain the gold which they won in Manchester with a record total of 184. Rathore and Bhatnagar finished seven points behind the winners, scoring 179.

The Games record was broken by the Australian pair of Mark Russell and Craig William Trembath who shot a total of 186 for the gold. Russell fired 47 and 46 in his two rounds to make it a total of 93 and his team-mate Trembath shot 46 and 47 to have an identical score of 93, taking their combined total to 186.

Rathore missed five targets in the first series and six in the second. He had 44 in the first and 45 in the second. Vikram had a first series of 46 and then shot 44 in his next for a total of 90, good only for the silver.

England's Richard Faulds 89 (45, 44) and Steven Walton 87 (47, 40) totalled 176 to clinch the bronze. — Agencies

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail