Asian Wrestling C'ships: Anju, Harshita win silver, Sarita Mor exits early

The gold medal eluded the Indian wrestlers as experienced Sarita Mor exited in the first round while youngsters Anju and Harshita won the silver medal at the Asian Wrestling Championships on Sunday.

The day started with a shock as experienced Sarita Mor lost her quarterfinal bout 4-8 to Mongolia's Gantuya Enkhbat. The 2021 World Championship medalist was a firm favourite in 57kg weight category.

However, Anju (53kg) and Harshita (72kg) put out a good show to win silver medals in their category.

Competing in a highly competitive 53kg weight category, Anju logged back-to-back wins by technical superiority against Philippines' Aliah Rose Gavalez and Sri Lanka's Nethmi Ahinsa Fernando.

She faced some resistance from China's Chun Lei before prevailing 9-6 in the semifinal.

In the final, Anju clashed with North Korea's Ji Hyang Kim but, much to the surprise of everyone, she could not score even a single point and lost the gold-medal match by technical superiority.

Harshita conceded just three points en route to the final, outclassing Uzbekistan's Ozoda Zaripboeva by technical superiority (13-3) and beating Kazakhstan's Anastassiya Panassovich 5-0.

However, she could not find a way to go past China's Qian Jiang, losing the 72kg title clash 2-5.

Manisha Bhanwala (62kg) and Antim Kundu (65kg) won bronze medals.

Overall, Indian women's wrestlers ended up with six medals -- three silver and as many bronze.

Radhika had won a silver in the 68kg competition while Shivanee Pawar had earned a bronze finish on Saturday.

In men's freestyle wrestling, India had won a silver through Udit (57kg) while Abhimanyou (70kg) and Vicky (97kg) had clinched bronze in their respective categories.

The Greco-Roman style competition will begin on Monday.