Manu Bhaker, Abhishek Verma among eight from Tokyo omitted

A new-look Indian shooting team will compete in the season’s first ISSF World Cup in Cairo from February 26. Only five of the 13 rifle and pistol shooters from the Tokyo Olympics have made the squad announced by the National Rifle Association of India (NRAI) on Thursday.

The 24-member squad was selected on the basis of performance in the national shooting championships. With the national trials scheduled this month cancelled because of Covid-19, the selection committee accounted for the qualification scores along with the final ranking points of the national championships. A preparatory camp will be held at the Karni Singh shooting range in New Delhi from February 9.

Pistol shooters Manu Bhaker and Abhishek Verma, rifle shooters Apurvi Chandela, Elavaneil Valarivan and Anjum Moudgil were among the big names from Tokyo who were not included. The five Olympics shooters who have kept their places are: Saurabh Chaudhary (10m air pistol), Divyansh Singh Panwar (10m air rifle), Rahi Sarnobat (25m sports pistol), Aishwarya Pratap Tomar and veteran Sanjeev Rajput (both 50m rifle 3 positions).

The World Cup will be the first major competition following the disappointing show in Tokyo. The focus will be on the two big events of the year: the Asian Games in Hangzhou from September 9 and ISSF World Championships, also in Cairo, from October 10.

“The selection trials had to be cancelled but the coaches recommended that we should send a team to Cairo because the World Championships will also be held at the same venue and it was important to start the season,” said rifle coach Deepali Deshpande, who will travel with the team.

Some of the medallists from the 2021 ISSF Junior World Championships in Peru have been included. “We have to see how they perform in a top international event. It will help us to assess as we prepare the team for Asian Games and World Championships,” said Deshpande.

As per the new policy of the NRAI, a shooter can participate in only two of the four World Cups in a year, though the final call will be taken by the selection committee.

Apart from Chaudhary, Army’s Kedarling Balakrishna Uchaganve, Gaurav Rana, who won bronze in the junior world championship in the 50m pistol in 2018, and Pradhyumn Singh have been selected in the 10m air pistol.

The 17-year-old pistol shooter, Esha Singh, who recently won two silver medals in the junior world championships, has been named for both air pistol and 25m sports pistol events. P Shri Nivetha and Ruchita Vinerkar are the other two shooters in the air pistol event.

Though Bhaker won the national championships in 10m air pistol for the second successive time, she stood fourth in the overall rankings. In sports pistol Sarnobat, will be joined by Esha and Rhythm Sangwan.

The men’s 10m air rifle team will have two new faces in Rudranksh Balasaheb Patil, who won a junior world championships silver, and Srinjoy Datta, besides former world No. 1 Panwar, who won the national title.

Shreya Agarwal, Ayushi Gupta and Rajshree Sancheti are part of the women’s air rifle team. In men’s rifle 3 positions, Tomar, Kiran Ankush Yadav and Ashil Sheoran and Rajput have been selected. The women’s rifle 3 positions will have Sift Kaur Samra and Shriyanka Sadangi taking part. In 25m rapid fire pistol men Anish, Bhavesh Shekhawat and Gurpreet Singh have made the cut.

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