Bajrang Punia, Vinod Kumar win bronze

Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan): Defending champion Bajrang Punia settled for a bronze in the men’s 65kg freestyle as Indian grapplers bagged two medals on the penultimate day of the Senior Asian Wrestling Championships here on Saturday.

Vinod Kumar Omprakash won the other bronze medal in the men’s 70kg freestyle. The two medals took India’s tally to eight one gold, one silver and six bronze medals.

Bajrang lost 5-7 in the quarterfinals to Daichi Takatani of Japan. But the 24-year-old Haryana wrestler got the chance to play in the repechage round after his conqueror reached the final.

Bajrang first accounted for Abdulqosim Fayziev of Tajikistan 12-2 in the repechage round and then beat Yones Aliakbar Emamichoghaei of Iran 10-4 in the bronze medal play-off.

Vinod Kumar lost in the quarterfinals (3-6) to Ikhtiyor Navruzov of Uzbekistan but came through the repechage and was adjudged the bronze medal winner against Elaman Dogdurbek Uulu of Kyrgyzstan by virtue of scoring the last point in a 3-3 thriller.