Paris Diamond League 2023: India’s Murali Sreeshankar logs 8.09m to finish third in long jump
Reigning Olympic champion Miltiadis Tentoglou of Greece won the event with an 8.13m attempt. Tokyo 2020 bronze medallist Maykel Masso of Cuba was sixth.
Athletics
India’s Murali Sreeshankar registered an impressive 8.09m attempt to finish third in the men’s long jump event at the Paris Diamond League 2023 athletics in France on Saturday.
Murali Sreeshankar logged his best jump of the night with his third attempt. The 8.09m effort put him in the second spot, only behind the reigning Olympic and Diamond League champion Miltiadis Tentoglou of Greece, who won the Paris Diamond League with an 8.13m jump.
However, a foul from S Murali in the fourth attempt and an 8.11m jump by Switzerland’s Simon Ehammer, the 2022 world championships bronze medallist, pushed the Indian long jumper down to the third spot.
Murali Sreeshankar’s fifth attempt read 7.99m and his sixth run down the track ended with a foul.
This was Murali Sreeshankar’s second appearance in the Diamond League. Last year in Monaco, he came sixth with an effort of 7.94m. His personal best jump is 8.36m which he logged last year. India’s national record in men’s long jump belongs to Jeswin Aldrin, who hit 8.42m earlier this year.
Murali Sreeshankar came into the Paris leg of the Diamond League after winning three consecutive gold medals.
The 24-year-old Indian athlete won a World Athletics Continental Tour bronze label event in Kallithea, Greece last month with his season-best jump of 8.18m and made the cut for the upcoming Asian Games in the People's Republic of China.
Earlier, Sreeshankar started his season by winning the Indian Grand Prix in March with a 7.94m jump. The Indian athlete also topped the podium at the MVA High-Performance athletics meet in the USA with an 8.29m wind-assisted effort.
A total of 10 athletes competed in the men’s long jump event in Paris. Tokyo 2020 Olympic bronze medallist Maykel Masso of Cuba endured an underwhelming day and came sixth with the best jump of 7.83m.
The meeting in Paris was the fourth leg of the Diamond League, an annual series of top-tier track and field competitions organised by World Athletics. However, it was the first time this year that the men’s long jump was featured in the list of events.
Points in the Diamond League are awarded to athletes based on their performances in each leg and the top six athletes in each event qualify for the final. This year, the Diamond League Final will be held in Eugene, USA, on September 16 and 17.