Deepika Kumari reaches semis of Archery World Cup Stage 1

The Archery World Cup Stage 1, held in Shanghai, saw a remarkable performance by India’s Deepika Kumari. The former world number one archer, who has slipped to world No. 142 and qualified as the 30th seed in the rankings round, overcame a 1-3 deficit to defeat Korea’s Jeon Hunyoung. The match ended with a score of 6-4 (27-28, 27-27, 29-28, 29-27, 28-28) in the women’s recurve individual quarterfinal.

Deepika Kumari bounced back after an early setback

Deepika started with an eight, lost the first set 27-28, but continued to improve and levelled the second at 27-all, before taking the third (29-28) by dropping just one point. From three-all, there was no stopping Deepika, who went on to drill in four 10s including two X (closer to centre) from six arrows to make the semis.

This victory is particularly significant as it comes after Deepika embraced motherhood in December 2022 and returned to win the Asia Cup gold in Baghdad in February this year. Her next challenge in the tournament will be against Korean teenager Nam Suhyeon, who qualified as the seventh seed. The other half will feature top seed and 20-year-old world No. 2 Korean Lim Sihyeon taking on Li Jiaman of China.

Meanwhile, the other three female recurve archers, Kamalika Bari, Bhajan Kaur, and Ankita Bhakat, had a disappointing World Cup as they were eliminated early in the competition, losing their respective round of 64 matches.

In men’s recurve, Tarundeep Rai had an impressive run in the knockout rounds but fell short in the quarterfinals, losing 3-7 to Spain’s Andres Temino. Meanwhile, third-seeded Dhiraj Boomadvera exited in the round of 16 to another Spanish archer, Ken Antoku Sanchez.

Also Read: India’s Stellar Performance at the Wushu World Cup Qualifying Championships