By IANS,
Beijing : India’s women archers Dola Banerjee and Laishram Bombayla Devi made first round exits from the individual event, going down to lower-ranked opponents at the Beijing Olympic Games here Tuesday.
Seasoned campaigner Dola, who finished 31st in the ranking round, lost in a shoot-off after a close contest with 34th placed Marie Pier Beaudet of Canada at the Olympic Green Archery Field.
Dola, who turned 29 earlier this month, was tied 109-109 with her rival after the regulation arrows, before finishing at the wrong end of a 8-10 scoreline in the one-arrow shoot-off.
Earlier, the Indian trailed by three points after the first nine regulation arrows, but pushed the battle to the shoot-off with a good score of 28 in the last set of three arrows.
The young Bombayla missed out on a pre-quarterfinal berth, losing by two points to Polish Iwona Marcinkiewicz.
The Indian, ranked 22nd in the qualifying round, paid dearly for a poor score of six with the last shot of her second set of arrows that tilted the scales in Marcinkiewicz’s favour.
The East European, who finished 21 places below the Indian in the ranking competition, came up with scores of 26, 24, 27 and 24 in her four sets to move into the pre-quarterfinals.
V. Pranitha is the lone Indian competitor left in the women’s race.
Now the country’s best medal hope is Mangal Singh Champia, who had a splendid ranking round, finishing second. Champia returns to the arena Wednesday when the men’s individual competition begins.