Medal Prospects in Beijing

With only 4 days to go, let’s look at some of the medal prospects for India in Beijing.

R. S Rathore: Expectations are already high after his performance in 2004. In 2005 Commonwealth Shooting Championships in Melbourne, he was the member of the winning team in the double trap event. He won the gold in the individual and team events in Men's double trap at the 2005 Asian Clay Shooting Championships at Bangkok. The gold in the individual event was the third consecutive one for Rathore at the annual events after the ones in 2003 and 2004, thus constituting a hat trick.

Abhinav Bindra: This 25 year old is a veteran of 2 Olympics. Though he was not successful in getting the medal for past two times, he still is counted as a strong prospect. The road to Beijing has been full of troubles though for him. After his failure in getting his hands on the medal in Athens, Bindra returned with the World Championship in 2006, 4 medals in the Commonwealth. But then he has to struggle with the Spine injury and is forced out of the games for more than a year. That he is now fit and ready to fight for a medal in the mother of all the competitions, speaks immense about his courage and fighting spirit.

Dola Banerajee: First Indian woman archer to be at Olympics. She has already represented India at 2004 games as well. Trained from Tata Archery Academy, Dola created history by winning the 18th Golden Arrow Grand Prix tournament 2005 at Antalya, Turkey where she defeated Ukrainian third seed Tatyana Dorokhova. At the 2006 SAF Games held in Colombo, Dola out shot compatriot Reena Kumari to bag the women's individual re-curve gold in archery.

Sania Mirza: The amazing 21 years old Hyderabad based Tennis player is the best India has ever produced. Her best carrier ranking being 27 in the world. She has been consistently performing at the international stage. Apart from her performance at the Tennis Circuit, she also has to her name 3 medals (Gold in mixed doubles, Silver in Singles and Silver in Team event) at the Doha Asian Games. It remains to be seen if she can repeat that in Beijing as well.

Saina Nehwal: This 18 year old girl is the first Indian woman to win a 4-start badminton event (Philippines Open in 2006). Ranked 15 in the world she should be a tough competition for others in the event. She also has a Bronze to her name in the 2006 Commonwealth games.


A. Lalit Lakra: A 26 year old boxer from Jharkhand, he was the first Indian boxer to book a ticket to the Beijing last year. He will be contesting in the featherweight category. He was in fabulous form in 2007 during the World Championships in Chicago. He has consistently performed at the international stage. His best being the Gold medal in Commonwealth Championships in Glasgow.

Akhil Kumar: This 26 year old Bhiwani lad is going to the Olympics for a 2^nd time. Athens was not a happy outing for Akhil but he has come ages since then. His run up to Beijing includes a Gold in 2005 Commonwealth championships, Gold in 2006 Commonwealth Games and Gold in Asian Olympic qualifying tournament. He also has struggled with a career threatening wrist injury, which kept him out of action in 2007. He is the senior most member of the boxing team and is the only one with Olympic experience.

Dinesh Kumar: 20 year old boxer from Bhiwani will be fighting for a medal in the light heavyweight category. He performances at the international stage are : Gold in SAAF games in 2006 and silver in Asian Boxing Qualifiers 2008 which gave him the ticket to the games.

Anju Bobby George: She shot to fame when she won the Bronze medal in 2003 World Championships in Athletics. Thus becoming the first Indian to do so. She went on to win the silver medal at the IAAF World Athletics Final in 2005, a performance she considers her best.

Anjali Bhagwat: In the 2000 Sydney Olympics, competing as a last-minute wildcard Anjali put up a spirited effort to become only the second Indian woman to reach an Olympic final and ended a creditable seventh. At the 2002 Manchester Commonwealth Games, Anjali grabbed four gold medals at the 10 meter Air Rifle and 50 meter Rifle 3-position events.