Bishkek [Kyrgyzstan], June 1 : Manjeet, a 55kg Greco-Roman wrestler, captured a bronze medal on the first day of the Bishkek Ranking Series 2023 in Kyrgyzstan on Thursday.
In the bronze-medal match, Manjeet was up against Yersin Abyir of Kazakhstan. However, the 32-year-old Indian wrestler utilised all of his experience to defeat Yersin Abyir, 23, 14-9, as per Olympics.com.
Earlier, Manjeet started his campaign in the quarterfinals, but things did not go well. Ikhtiyor Botirov of Uzbekistan, the U23 Asian champion from the previous year, defeated him due to technical superiority, but because Botirov advanced to the final, Manjeet was given a chance to win bronze.
The only wrestler from India to take home a medal on Thursday was Manjeet. The day's other four Indian wrestlers did not get to the medal rounds.
Neeraj, who took home bronze at the 2023 Asian Championships in Kazakhstan in April, advanced to the 67kg repechage round despite losing to Husiyuetu of the People's Republic of China, the winner of the Zagreb Open, 9-0. However, Neeraj was eliminated after losing to Mahmud Bakhshilloev of Uzbekistan 5-2.
In the 87 kg qualifying round, Sunil Kumar was defeated 4-2 by Kyrgyzstan's Azat Salidinov, while in the 97 kg qualifying round, Narinder Cheema was defeated 2-0 by Uzbekistan's Rustam Assakalov. In the qualification round, Sahil was defeated 8-0 by Lingzhe Meng of China in the 130-kg weight class due to technical superiority.
At the Bishkek Ranking Series, also known as the Kaba Uulu Kozhomkul & Raatbek Sanatbaev wrestling series, only the Greco-Roman wrestlers competed on Thursday.
On Friday and Saturday, Indian women's wrestlers will hit the mat. Then on Sunday, Indian men's freestyle wrestlers, including Olympic silver medalist Ravi Kumar Dahiya, will compete.
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