Ankita Bhakat and Dheeraj Bommadevara missed out on winning the bronze medal in the mixed team event of archery at the Paris Olympics 2024. In the bronze medal match, Ankita-Dheeraj were defeated by USA’s Brady Ellison and Casey Kaufhold 2-6. The American pair had won the first two sets. After this, the Indian pair came back and won the third set, but then in the fourth set, USA once again won. The Indian pair had earlier lost 2-6 to Korea in the semi-finals.
However, despite missing out on a medal, Ankita-Dheeraj created history. For the first time, Indian players reached the semi-finals in any archery event in the Olympics. India could not qualify in archery only in Sydney Olympics 2000. Apart from this, he has participated in all the Olympic Games, but could not improve his performance. Archery was included in the Olympics in 1988 and since then Indian archers have been participating in almost every Olympic Games, but have so far failed to reach the podium. What this means is that India has not been able to win a single medal in the archery events of the Olympics so far.
Result Update: #Archery🏹 Mixed Team Bronze Medal Match👇
A near miss for our archers💔.
Ankita Bhakat and @BommadevaraD agonizingly miss out on a podium finish at #ParisOlympics2024.
The 🇮🇳 Indian duo came close in a 4️⃣ set match by a score line of 2-6.
Keep your heads… pic.twitter.com/DQqw4GOrhF
— SAI Media (@Media_SAI) August 2, 2024
Deepika and Bhajan Kaur have reached pre-quarter finals
Now India has hopes from Deepika Kumari and Bhajan Kaur in Paris Olympics. Deepika and Bhajan have reached the pre-quarterfinals of the women’s individual archery event. Deepika will face Germany’s Michelle Kroppen in the pre-quarterfinals on August 3. On August 3 itself, Bhajan Kaur will face Dayananda Choirunisa of Indonesia. However, the bad news for India is that if Deepika and Bhajan win their respective matches, then they will face each other in the quarter-finals. That means only one archer can reach the semi-finals.
This is the first time after the London Olympics 2012, while the Indian team includes 6 players. Indian men’s and women’s teams had qualified for the Olympics on the basis of ranking, due to which this time Indian archers were participating in 5 events. This was the fourth Olympics for experienced Tarundeep Rai and Deepika Kumari. All the male archers of India could not make it to the top 30 in the Tokyo Olympics, due to which the Indian team was seeded 9th. India’s only female archer Deepika had secured 9th position. India then had to face defeat from top seed Korea in their respective quarter-final matches.
Who are Dheeraj Bommadevara and Ankita Bhakat?
Even though Ankita-Dheeraj could not win the medal, they definitely won the hearts of the fans with their brilliant performance. 26 year old Ankita Bhakat, resident of West Bengal, has realized her dream of winning a medal in the Olympics on the basis of her hard work. His father used to work as a milkman. Ankita never gave up and struggled. At the age of just 10, Ankita started trying her hand at archery. Ankita had participated in a local archery competition at the Circus Ground in Kolkata.
Ankita started practicing with borrowed equipment in the local club and learned the tricks of archery. In 2014, she got a place in Tata Archery Academy. Initially, Ankita learned the art of archery under the guidance of coaches Dharmendra Tiwari, Purnima Mahato and Ram Awadhesh. Purnima Mahato is also with the team in Paris as a coach.
In 2015, Ankita represented India in the World Archery Youth Championship, when she was just 18 years old. This year, Ankita captured silver and bronze in the Seoul International Youth Archery Fest. In 2017, he also played the finals of Asia Cup and Indian Senior National Championship. After this he never looked back.
22-year-old Dheeraj Bommadevara from Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh won a medal at the Paris Olympics with his extraordinary archery skills. Dheeraj’s journey in archery began in 2006 at the Volga Archery Academy in Vijayawada under the guidance of his father Bommadevara Shravan Kumar, who is one of the best archery masters in Indian archery. Was the technical officer of the union.
Dheeraj made his international debut in 2017 and got his first major success in 2021, when he won the gold medal at the World Archery Youth Championship. In 2021, Dheeraj joined the Indian Army after completing a four-year training program at the Army Sports Institute in Pune.