Samresh finally makes cut

Samresh Jung’s long battle is finally over. Only the war remains, and that will be fought in Beijing, August 2008. Meanwhile, Jung, who became the eighth shooter to win...

Samresh Jung’s long battle is finally over. Only the war remains, and that will be fought in Beijing, August 2008. Meanwhile, Jung, who became the eighth shooter to win the ‘quota’ place for India, can train his guns in the elite company of seven others who have already booked berths for the Chinese capital.

Jung, who was bestowed with the David Dixon Award after being adjudged the best athlete at the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne for five-gold, one silver, one bronze effort — had been struggling ever since he left Australia last March.

Since then he had competed in quite a few World Cup meets hoping to win an Olympic berth. However, before leaving for Germany Jung had vowed to return to form. And at the ISSSF World Cup in Munich, today he shot his best.

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Jung scored 584 and 98.6 to finish fourth and clinch a quota place for himself in 10m air pistol. According to National Rifle Association of India (NRAI) secretary Baljeet Singh Sethi, the air pistol king was in fine form and until the seventh round was bang on target, leading the pack. But then came the eight and ninth rounds where he misfired a couple of shots and the scores dipped to 8 and 8, pulling him down the ladder. Nevertheless, he was able to keep his nerve to finish fourth and thus earn a berth for himself.

Jung, according to Sethi, expressed satisfaction over his Olympic berth but admitted to him that he would need to do still better to win medal in Beijing.

However, Sethi was happy that Indian shooters were approaching the target set for them. What Sethi meant was that he expected them to win at 15 ‘quota’ places for India and the shooters were slowly but surely approaching the mark.

The other shooters who had won Olympics berths include Sanjeev Rajput (free rifle), Manavjit Singh Sandhu (trap), Col RS Rathore (double trap), Avneet Kaur (air rifle), Gangan Narang (air rifle), Anjali Bhagwat (3-position) and Abhinav bindra (air rifle).

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Sethi also said he was hopeful that at least a couple of more ‘quota’ berths should come India’s way at the Munich meet. “I am hoping for berths in air rifle and air pistol (women) and free pistol (men) events,” he said.