In Osijek, Manu Bhaker and Saurabh Chaudhary won silver in the 10m Air Pistol Mixed Team event

Manu Bhaker and Saurabh Chaudhary, India’s star shooters, won a silver medal in the 10m Air Pistol Mixed Team Event at the ISSF World Cup in Osijek, Croatia on Saturday. The Indians were defeated 12-16 by Vitalina Batsarashkina and Artem Chernousov of Russia in the gold medal match.

In the 10m Air Pistol Mixed Team Event, Manu Bhaker and Saurabh Chaudhary were aiming for their sixth World Cup gold medal in a row. Their winning streak began in 2019 in the New Delhi World Cup. They have won gold medals in New Delhi, Beijing, Munich, and Rio de Janeiro in 2019 and they followed that up with another gold medal in New Delhi earlier this year.

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Their winning streak, however, came to an end in Osijek when they faced the experienced Batsarashkina and Chernousov. Saurabh and Manu were down 2-6 after the sixth series, but they rallied to tie the game at 6-6. They faltered once more, with Manu failing to hit 10-pointers with consistency. With a 12-6 advantage, the Russians appeared to be cruising to victory, but the Indian duo rallied back to tie the game at 12-12.

After then, the Russians clinched the gold medal by winning the next two series.

Meanwhile, India’s Abhishek Verma and Yashaswini Deswal ended outside the podium in the Mixed Team Air Pistol event after losing their bronze medal match 7-17 to Iran’s Golnoush Sebghatollahi and Javad Foroughi.

India has won three medals at the ISSF World Cup, which takes place a month before the Tokyo Olympics. Saurabh Chaudhary earned bronze in the 10m Air Pistol earlier this week, while Manu, Rahi Sarnobat, and Yashaswi Deswal won bronze in the 10m Air Pistol women’s team event. The Indian rifle shooters competing in the 10m air mixed event, on the other hand, had a poor showing.

Both teams were unable to get to the final. Elavenil Valarivan and Divyansh Singh Panwar qualified for the second qualifying round, finishing sixth with 416.1 points
Anjum Moudgil and Deepak Kumar failed to clear the first qualifying round. The pair came a disappointing 15th for a total of 624.6.