Hangzhou, Oct 5: U-20 World Champion Antim Panghal advanced to the quarterfinals in the women’s freestyle 53kg wrestling at the 19th Asian Games on Thursday.
Antim scored five technical points in the first half and six in the second to win easily 11-0 against the reigning Asian Championships silver medallist Jasmina Immaeva.
Antim will face the 2021 World Wrestling Championships gold medalist Akari Fujinami from Japan in the quarterfinals.
Earlier, Sunil Kumar bagged India’s first medal in Men’s Greco-Roman 87kg in almost 13 years in the Asian Games after getting better of Kyrgyzstan’s Atabek Azisbekov on Wednesday.
Atabek took the lead in the first round after Sunil was called for passivity, the Indian was forced to defend from the upside-down position and managed to keep the deficit to just a single point.
Sunil levelled the game after the Kyrgyzstan wrestler was called for passivity and made the score one-all. Atabek managed to momentarily gain two points by pushing Sunil out of bounds to take a 3-1 lead.
The Indian challenged the decision and got it overturned to bring the scoreline back to 1-1. Sunil was ahead on the criteria and got the decisive point in the final moments of the match. Sunil clinched the bronze medal in the category.