A young Indian team will take part at the Archery Asia Cup 2022 Stage-2 world ranking tournament to be held at Sulaymaniyah Sports Club in Iraq from May 6 to 11.
The six-day continental meet will feature both recurve and compound archers.
India have a 16-member contingent, eight men and eight women, competing at the event. All archers selected for the event are below the age of 20.
Big names like Atanu Das, Deepika Kumari, Tarundeep Rai, Pravin Jadhav and Abhishek Verma are not competing.
Sakshi Chaudhary, 19, will lead the women’s compound archery team. Sakshi Chaudhary won individual gold at the Asia Cup 2022 stage-1 in Thailand in March by defeating team-mate Parneet Kaur in the final. She also won the silver at the world youth archery championships in Poland last year.
The men’s compound team will be spearheaded by 19-year-old Rishabh Yadav, who had clinched the individual silver medal at the stage-1 event. The men’s recurve team, meanwhile, will have the national champion Parth Salunkhe as the main medal prospect.
At the Asia Cup 2022 stage-1 archery world ranking tournament held in March, India returned with eight medals - two gold and six silver.
The Asia Cup 2022 stage-2 event in Iraq will present an opportunity for the young Indian archers to impress ahead of the Asian Games and Commonwealth Games scheduled later this year.
Asia Cup 2022 Sulaymaniyah: India archery team
Recurve Men: Juyel Sarkar, Vinayak Verma, Parth Salunkhe, Mrinal Chauhan
Recurve Women: Bhajan Kaur, Tisha Sancheti, Laxmi Hembrom, Avani
Compound Men: Rishabh Yadav, Prathamesh Jawkar, Kushal Dalal, Prathamesh Fuge
Compound Women: Aditi Swami, Parneet Kaur, Sakshi Chaudhary, Pragati
Archery Asia Cup 2022 Sulaymaniyah schedule
May 6, Friday – Official practice
May 7, Saturday – Qualification round for recurve and compound
May 8, Sunday – Team/mixed team eliminations and finals and individual eliminations
May 9, Monday – Team eliminations and finals
May 10, Tuesday – Finals compound - individual and team
May 11, Wednesday – Finals recurve - individual and team