India has sent its largest ever contingent of 127 members for the Tokyo Olympics and are realistically hopeful of achieving its best ever medal tally.
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India has sent its largest ever contingent for the Tokyo Olympics 2020. The 127 members will compete across 85 events. Unlike the previous Olympics this time around the Indian team’s hopes are realistically high as we have a number of players occupying world ranking of 1,2 and 3 in their respective disciplines. Meanwhile five years ago India came back with just two medals, PV Sindhu’s silver and Sakshi Malik’s bronze. Many of the former Olympians including 2008 Beijing Olympics gold medalist Abhinav Bindra believe that this could be India’s best ever Olympics. Therefore don’t be surprised if India’s medal tally touches the two-digit mark. Let’s look at some of the disciplines and top medal prospects.
It all started in 2004, when Colonel Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore won the silver medal in men’s double trap event at Athens. And India’s only individual gold medal was also from shooting, when Bindra triumphed in the 10m air rifle event. Meanwhile this time also we boost a very strong 15-member contingent with the likes of Elavanil Valarivan, Abhishek Verma and Rahi Sarnobat ranked number one in the world. 19-year-old Manu Bhaker and Saurabh Chaudhary are the top medal contenders. Bhaker has won World Championship gold medals as well as Commonwealth and Youth Olympics medals. Saurabh is ranked number two in the world and is a Youth Olympics champion. And he was also the youngest Indian to win a medal at the Asian Games in 2018, he was just 16.
The duo of Bhaker and Choudhary will also compete in the 10m air pistol mixed event, which is making its debut in the Olympics. They have won five successive gold’s at international shooting events and a silver at the World Cup in June. Therefore India is optimistic of winning somewhere around 3 to 8 medals in Shooting at Tokyo.
India’s first ever individual medal was delivered by wrestler KD Jadhav when he won the bronze medal in the 1952 Helsinki Olympics. But after that we had to wait for 56 years, until Sushil Kumar won a bronze in Beijing. Since then India has won a medal in every Olympics so far.
Vinesh Phogat is undoubtedly India’s biggest medal prospect at Tokyo, she can also be touted as a gold medal prospect. The 26-year-old is the world number one in the 53kg freestyle category and she won the bronze medal in the 2019 World Championship.
On the other hand Bajrang Punia is seeded second and will be competing in the men’s 65kg category. The 27-year-old is the only Indian wrestler to win three World Wrestling Championship medals. And he is also the Asian Games champion. Therefore along with Phogat, Bajarag is also a top medal prospect from wrestling. Meanwhile Deepak Punia is seeded second in the men’s 85kg category and Ravi Kumar will compete in the 57kg and both of them can be seen as dark horses.
Apart from shooting and wrestling, Badminton is an event which has given us multiple medals in the recent past. Saina Nehwal won the bronze in 2012 and then Sindhu bettered it by a step in 2016. Sindhu won the 2019 World Championship but since then hasn’t been in the best of form. She has had an inconsistent run to the Olympics. However the 26-year-old is more than capable of rising to the occasion and yielding results in the biggest stage as she has shown it before.
Even though the 2016 Olympic champion Carolin Marin has pulled out due to a knee injury that doesn’t make things any easier for the Indian. Women’s Badminton is at its best period in its history with multiple players genuinely in contention for an Olympic gold and there is very little separating them. The likes of TAI Tzu Ying, Chen Yu Fei, Nozomi Okuhara and Akane Yamaguchi will provide stiff competition.
In the men’s section Sai Praneeth is a World Championship bronze medalist and has the chance of meeting world number one Kento Momota in the quarter-final. And he will need to overcome the Japanese to have any chance of getting on to the podium.
The men’s doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty are placed in Group A and will need to punch above their weight to qualify from the group.
India has sent its largest ever boxing contingent of 9 members to Tokyo, with two realistic medal contenders in the form of legendary pugilist Mary Kom and world number one Amit Panghal. Mary Kom is aiming for her second Olympic medal after securing a bronze in the 2012 London Olympics. The Manipuri boxer won Silver at the Asian Boxing Championship in Dubai two months ago. She is also the only female to have won the World Amateur Boxing Championship six times.
Panghal on the other hand is an Army man who is a World Championship silver medalist. The 25-year-old is also a Boxing World Cup 2020 gold medalist. His biggest opponent is going to be defending champion Shakhobidin Zoirov who got the better of the Indian in the final of Asian Boxing Championship final in the 52kg category.
Archery has been an event that gives so much of hopes before the start of the Olympics but fails miserably at the competition. However this time around Deepika Kumari looks set to win India’s first Olympic medal in Archery. Deepika is again coming into the games as world number one in women’s recurve category. She won three gold’s at the Archery World Cup held in Paris last month.
The 27-year-old will partner with her husband Atanu Das in the mixed pair competition. There is no doubt about Deepika’s talent and ability. It is only about delivering it at the biggest stage, let’s hope this might be the year as she now has the experience of two Olympics.
India’s national game has given the country the maximum number of medals in Olympics-11, that includes 8 gold’s, 2 silver and 1 bronze. But those were the heyday of Indian hockey. India won it’s last Olympic medal in hockey in 1980 Moscow. However this time around the men’s team is placed fourth in the world rankings and are coming into the games on the back of some impressive performances. Under head coach Graham Reid the team has played 37 games and won 27 of them while losing only 5 and drew 5.
Athletics has never been India’s strongest discipline. Making into the final itself is considered as a good result as very few have achieved it. But Tokyo 2020 could be a game changer. Javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra is a strong medal contender. The 23-year-old is the national record holder with his best throw of 88.07m. If he get’s anywhere close to the 90m mark in Tokyo he could very well be in contention for a podium finish.
Mirabai Chanu is the lone weightlifter in the Indian team. The 26-year-old will compete in the women’s 49kg category and currently she is placed fourth in the world rankings. Meanwhile with North Korea not participating in the Tokyo Olympics and China allowed to send only one weightlifter in the women’s 49 kg category, it will make Chanu’s best of 203kg, second-best in the category prior to the start of the competition. Therefore she has a very good chance to win India’s second ever medal in the discipline after Karnam Malleswari won the bronze in the 2000 Sydney Olympics.
