The 2018 Asian Games will get underway on August 18 in Indonesia and India will be eager to eclipse their medal tally in the last edition in Incheon. The 524-member Indian contingent features 277 men and 247 women athletes from a total of 36 disciplines. There’s a good mix of youth and experience in the Indian ranks, especially in the women’s category.
Punjab’s quarter-miler Kamaljeet Sandhu was the first Indian woman athlete to win a gold medal at the Asian Games, at Bangkok in 1970. In the following editions of the biggest sports festival of Asia, the country, riding on ‘girl power’, clinched several medals through the likes of P T Usha and Sania Mirza.
Let’s take a look at some of the female athletes who are among the favourites to bring glory to the country this time around:
Saina Nehwal (Badminton)
P V Sindhu might have upstaged her as the top female shuttler in India, but the Haryana lass still is one of the best around. Saina has done what no other woman badminton player could do - making badminton popular in a country obsessed with cricket. In fact, the bronze she won at the 2012 London Olympics had the sparkle of gold.
The 28-year-old, who has struggled with a knee injury ever since the 2015 World Championship, looks fully fit and raring to go. The win against Sindhu in the Commonwealth Games final last April would definitely do her confidence a world of good. The only medal she could win at the Asian Games is a bronze in the women's team event at Incheon in 2014.
P V Sindhu (Badminton)
The queen of Indian badminton P V Sindhu heads into this edition of the Asian Games as a hot favourite to clinch the yellow metal. While her Olympic silver in 2016, where she lost to Spain’s Carolina Marin in an epic final, catapulted her to fame, she has actually stepped it up in the two years since. However, things will not be easy for both Sindhu and Saina in Indonesia as they will have two tricky opponents in Japan’s Nozomi Okuhara and Akane Yamaguchi. However, Sindhu is the biggest bet from India’s Asiad contingent given her status and performances over the past two years.
Hima Das (400m race)
Hima Das made history by becoming India's first ever track and field gold medallist at the IAAF World Championships a couple of weeks back, when she won the 400m event at the IAAF World U-20 Championships in Finland.
The daughter of a paddy farmer from Dhing village in Assam’s Nagaon district, Hima started off with football, kicking the ball with boys in the mud pits next to the rice fields, but just 18 months after running her first competitive race, the 18-year-old wiry-framed athlete joined an elite club of Indian athletes who have won medals at a global event. She clocked 51.46 sec to win the gold with an incredible burst in the final lap after trailing for most of the race.
Coming from behind and winning the race is not new for her. However, the level of competition would be stiffer in the Asian Games as she will be pitted against some of the formidable runners from Japan and China. Will she be able to repeat the World Championships magic and come back with a medal? Let’s wait and see.
Sakshi Malik (Wrestling)
Wrestler Sakshi Malik made history at the 2016 Rio Olympics by clinching bronze in the Women's Freestyle 58kg category. The expectations are high and there is optimism that she will manage a podium finish at the continental event. Sakshi will also be looking to put the disappointing outing at the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games this April behind her where she had to be content with bronze.
She will be competing in a different weight class – 63kg freestyle – in Indonesia, and with some of the leading wrestlers from Mongolia, China and Japan scheduled to compete in that category, the 25-year-old will have to give her best to be the first Indian woman wrestler to win a gold at the Asiad. She will head to Jakarta after an exposure trip to Turkey.
Manu Bhaker (Shooting)
It will be surprising if India’s teenage shooting sensation Manu Bhaker fails to win a medal at the Asian Games. For, the 16-year-old Haryana girl has been winning medals at will at international events of late. Her international gold medal count stands at an amazing 10, an incredible feat for a teenager.
Earlier this year, she became the youngest Indian shooter to finish top of the podium at a global event when she claimed the individual gold medal in her maiden senior World Cup appearance in Mexico. She lived up to the expectations at the ensuing Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast by taking home the yellow metal.
At the Asian Games, the stage will get bigger and the expectations will go higher, but Bhaker, a native of Jhajjar district in Haryana, will be gunning for glory in her favourite 10m air pistol event at the Jakabaring International Shooting Range in Palembang. She is also expected to finish on the podium in the 25m sports pistol and mixed air pistol events.
