Mixed feelings surfaced among city’s archery fraternity on Monday. While the exit of Chittibomma Jignas, the Vijayawada archer, from the race to earn a berth to Incheon Asian Games was disappointing, the news of Jyothi Surekha and Purvasha Shinde making it to the final selections to be held at Hyderabad came as a solace.
In the first of the two selection trials held at Gachibowli on Sunday evening, Jignas finished seventh. Out of eight archers, six were shortlisted to final trials thus putting an end to Jignas’ dream of taking a flight to Korea.
Incidentally the 20-year-old, who represents Indian Army, won the Delhi Commonwealth Games silver medal in the compound segment in the 2010 partnering Ritual Chatterjee, another Vijayawada lad.
The precocious talent should consider himself unlucky as the elimination system by the Archery Association of India (AAI) went against him. He was forced to play against Delhi’s Abhishek Verma thrice in the four-day selection. “Had it been round robin system he would played against all the seven archers and proved his mettle. The elimination system went against him,” felt Mr. Rajasekhar, the archer’s father.
Meanwhile, there was a sense of déjà vu prevailed at the Krishna District Archery Association as two of its prominent girl archers — Surekha and Purvasha — came close to earning the Indian blazer for their maiden Asian Games.
Jyothi, a KLU mechanical engineering student, in the first selection trials, garnered 35.5 points out of 40 points to top the table while the 15-year-old Viswa Bharati High School girl Purvasha took the third place with 30 points. “They are among Trisha Deb (Punjab), Lily Chanu (Manipur), Jayalakshmi (Maharashtra) and Anjali Kumari (Bihar). Out of six only four will make it to Incheon,” said Andhra Pradesh Archery Association secretary Ch. Satyanarayana.
According to reliance sources, the AAI had decided to hold the final selection trial that begins from July 10 to 13, in round robin pattern thus giving an opportunity to all six archers to play against each other.
