Verma and Sureka defeated the fifth seed Sophie Dodemont and Jean Philippe Boulch 152-149 in front of a boisterous home crowd in a final that saw the Indian pair shine in a closely-fought contest
Compound archers Abhishek Verma and Jyothi Surekha stands on the podium after winning gold medal at the Archery World Cup Stage 3 in Paris on Saturday. Twitter/AAI
Indian archers tasted their first success at the ongoing Archery World Cup Stage 3 in Paris when the mixed team pair of Abhishek Verma and Jyothi Surekha won gold by defeating host nation France in the final on Saturday.
Verma and Sureka defeated the fifth-seeded pair of Sophie Dodemont and Jean Philippe Boulch 152-149 in front of a boisterous home crowd in a final that saw the Indian pair shine in a closely-fought contest.
The match stretched all the way to the final arrow of the fifth set despite them taking an early lead in the gold medal match.
This was also Abhishek’s third consecutive gold medal in the World Cup stages as he won the men’s compound team events in Turkey and South Korea earlier this year. The 32-year-old Arjuna Awardee also won the mixed team bronze medal in Gwangju while teaming up with Avneet Kaur.
Going into the final set with a slender lead of 134-132, the Indian duo never let the pressure get the better of them. The French pair, on the other hand, failed to find precision at the fag end while Verma responded with a perfect 10 to take the pressure off his teammate, who then shot a 9 to seal the gold.
Earlier on Friday, Verma-Surekha defeated Estonia to reach the final after seeing off El Salvador in the quarter.
World No 3 Surekha, who is making a comeback after getting dropped from the team early in the season, will have a shot at another medal as she will take on Dodemont in the women’s compound archery semi-final later in the day.
The women’s recurve team of Deepika Kumari, Ankita Bhakat and Simranjeet Kaur will play in the gold medal match against Chinese Taipei on Sunday.
Following the gold medal, India are now second in the 2022 Archery World Cup medal tally with four gold medals behind powerhouse South Korea, who have six gold medals.
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