Amman (Jordan), Mar 27: Putting up an expected dominating show, Olympian Reetika Hooda reached the final of the women’s 76kg category at the Asian Championship without losing a point, while three of her compatriots advanced to the bronze medal contention, here on Thursday.
The 22-year-old Reetika, who became first Indian female wrestler to be crowned U23 World Champion and youngest to qualify for Olympics, outclassed Japan’s Nodok Yamamoto and Korea’s Seoyeon Jeong on her way to the gold medal bout.
First up for her was Jeong, who she beat by technical superiority. She began the scoring with a take-down move and followed that up with a single-leg attack to add two more to her kitty. Reetika ended the bout in a jiffy when she got hold of the Korean’s legs and employed the ‘fitley’ move.
Against Yamamoto, the U23 World bronze medallist, Reetika followed the same pattern and in the second period found a way to pin her rival when she had a 6-0 lead.
Reetika had won a bronze at the 2023 Asian Championships in Astana.
In 55kg, Nishu lost her qualification bout to Yuxuan Li but the Chinese reached the final, opening the repechage route for the Indian. Capitalising on the chance, Nishu beat Vietnam’s My Trang Nguyen to set up a bronze medal clash against Mongolia’s Otgontuya Bayanmunkh.
Ankush (50kg) also made it to the repechage round after losing the opening bout by technical superiority to Japan’s Remina Yoshimoto but conceded the match against Korea’s Miran Cheon due an injury.
In 68kg Mansi Lather made a strong start, winning her opening bout against Korea’s Sheng Feng Cai by technical superiority and got a walk over from Japanese Ami Ishii.
She lost her semifinal 1-10 to China’s Zelu Li and will now fight for bronze with Kazakshtan’s Irina Kazyulina.
Also reaching the bronze medal clash was Muskan (59kg), who easily beat Philippines’ Arian G Carpio but lost her quarterfinal to Japan’s Sakura Onishi. She will now fight it out with Mongolia’s Altjin Togtokh. (PTI)
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