Samarakoon misses medal

Roshan and Ishara win at tennis:

Dinesh Weerawansa Reporting From China

Rifle shooter Mangala Samarakoon narrowly missed a medal while table tennis players Rohan Sirisena and Ishara Madurangi won all their singles and mixed doubles matches as Sri Lanka came out with their best performance at the 16th Asian Games on day four today.

Samarakoon, competing in men’s 50m air rifle prone event, kept Sri Lanka’s chances alive until the final stages on a day which he maintained high accuracy with the targets. However, he was unfortunate to miss a medal, settling for the fifth place in the final standings.

Even then, Samarakoon was placed eighth after this morning’s qualifying round in advancing to the finals. That was mainly due to two unimpressive initial rounds, though he recovered quickly to fire perfect hundreds in the last two rounds in finishing with scores of 97, 98, 99, 98, 100, 100 to total 592. Occupying the first three slots after 55 competitors took part in the qualifying round were South Koreans Jonghyun Kim (596), Hakman Kim (595) and Jinseop Kim (594).

The 30-year-old Lankan soldier was even more accurate in the final round with final shots of 10.1, 10.6, 10.3, 10.9, 10.0, 10.3, 10.6, 10.7, 10.3, 10.4 to obtain 104.2 in the final round, ahead of the ultimate gold medallist from South Korea, Hakman Kim who scored only 103.3 points in the final round. But he was at an advantageous position with the lead he had from the qualifying round to finish with a grand total of 698.3.

Out of the eight finalists, Sri Lanka’s Samarakoon had the best score in the final round but it was the first two unimpressive rounds in the qualifying rounds that deprived him of a medal. Considering the form he displayed in the final round, he would have even gone for the gold medal, had he been more accurate with his targets in the qualifying round.

Settling for the silver medal behind Korean Hakman Kim (698.3) was Yurly Melsitov o Kazakhstan (697.9), followed by the bronze medallist from China Hui Tian (697.4). In the fourth place was Korean Jinseop Kim (696.6), followed by Samarakoon (696.2). Had Samarakoon scored a couple of points more instead of his 97 in the first firing of the qualifying round, he would have well won the silver, just 0.1-point behind the gold medallist. But the lady luck did not smile with the Lankan lad.

It was so close and yet so far. I know it was the bad start which cost me a medal. Nevertheless, I am happy with my achievement,” Samarakoon said after his event.

Two other Lankans who competed with Samarakoon in the qualifying round of the men’s 50m rifle prone event were completely off colour, securing only 51st and 52nd places respectively - Sarath Chandrasiri (575) and Krishantha Kodikara (566).

China’s Wang Chengyi won the gold medal in womens 50m air rifle prone event. Her team mate from the host country, Li Xueyan won the gold medal in womens 10m running target shooting event. China also won the team event gold medal of the same.

Lankan paddlers in good form

The other noteworthy performance for Sri Lanka came in the table tennis championship which continued at Guangzhou Gymnasium today. Rohan Sirisena and Ishara Madurangi, both bronze medalists at the South Asian Games in Dhaka earlier this year, won their respective singles matches and the mixed doubles match to advance to next rounds. Sirisena and Madurangi beat Hoi Wa Chang and Chao In Ma of Macao by three sets to two to book a place in the pre-quarter finals of the mixed doubles event. Despite losing the second and third sets and trailing 1-2 in the tie, the Lankan duo staged a magnificent come back in the last two sets to win their first round match 11-7, 6-11, 11-13, 15-13, 11-8 in 30 minutes. It was one of the most keenly contested tussles.

The Lankan mixed pair combination of Sirisena and Madurangi will now meet Chin Chi Wu and Ching Cheng of Taiwan in the pre-quarter finals scheduled for Tuesday.

In the qualifying rounds of the men’s singles, Sirisena, a double medallist at 2010 South Asian Games, beat Thasisack Phathaphone of Laos by four sets to one in 26 minutes. Having lost the fourth set, Sirisena won a fully-stretched crucial fifth set to warp up the match 11-9, 11-7, 11-6, 5-11, 11-9. Sirisena will now take on India Sharath Achanta in the second round scheduled for Wednesday night.

Madurangi, the 20-year-old lass from Air Force, too was in equally fine form to win her women’s singles first round match against Nabia Shrestha of Nepal by four sets to one in 26 minutes. Having lost an exciting second set and tied at one-all, Madurangi fought her way back to win 11-5, 10-12, 11-9, 11-7, 11-7.

Unamboowe finishes last

But the rest of the Sri Lankan sportsmen and women who were seen in action today in swimming, rowing and sailing were completely off colour.

Heshan Unamboowe finished last in his men’s 50m freestyle heat three worked off at the Aoti Aquatic Centre this morning. He closed a leisured 25.11 seconds to finish last, way behind Singaporean Kai Quan Yeo who won the heat in 24.00 seconds.

Unamboowe was placed 30th out of 44 competitors who swam in the first round heats of the men’s 50m freestyle event. China’s Zhi Wu Lu who clocked an impressive 22.44 seconds to win the heat number five, was the most impressive of the lot, followed by Japan’s Rammaru Harada who won the heat number four in 22.71 seconds.

Sailors drown

Sri Lanka’s sailors continued their disgraceful performance by securing last places in their respective events once more, this time in their third and fourth round races.

Avishka de Alwis was placed eleventh and the last in both his men’s dinghy optimist races 3 and 4, which were won by Malaysian Khan Ali Sabri and Chinese Xiaotian Zhang respectively.

Krishan Weladagoda sailed no better in open laser races 3 and 4 to finish 12th and the last. Both these races were won by Japan’s Hisaki Nagai. Making a lavish contribution to Sri Lanka’s misery in sailing were Sureni Gunaratne and Lakshan Gunawardena. Gunaratne came ninth and the last in women’s dinghy optimist races 3 and 4, won by Singaporean Min Kimberly Lim and Thai Noppakao Poonpat respectively. Gunawardena was the other disappointment in men’s mistral race 3 and 4 won by Indonesian Gusti Sulaksana and Chinese Fuwen Yao. Gunawardene managed to finish last in both the race three and four.

It was the identical poor performance in sailing too as Sanjeev de Silva clocked 7:40.71 to finish sixth and the last in his lightweight men’s singles sculls heat race one.

He was way behind Japan’s D.Takeda who clocked 7:00.91, maintaining his lead right throughout the race. De Silva was placed third after the first 500m but slumped to fifth after the 1,000km mark.

Thaiwan down Sri Lanka

Taiwan beat Sri Lanka by two sets to nil in their South Asian Games women’s beach volleyball tournament match played on Monday night.

The Lankans failed to show any resistance to superior Thaiwan attack as they went down 7-21. 7-21.

Li Ping’s double world records

Defending champion Li Ping spring the biggest sensation of the Asian Games here when she broke two world records to win the womens 53kg weightlifting event. The Chinese lass raised 103kg in the snatch, one kilogramme more than the previous world record set by North Koreas Ri Song Hui in 2002, and continued her momentum by jerking 127kg to secure the gold medal with a total of 230kg, 4kg more than the previous world record set by Chinas Qiu Hongxia in 2006.

The 22 year-old champion weightlifter expressed her happiness after becoming the first athlete at the Guangzhou Asiad to thrash world record. “The snatch world record is a surprise to me as I am not good at it, but breaking the total world record is in our plan.” Li has surpassed all three world records in this category at last years National Games, but the sound performance was not written into world records books because the sporting governing body, the International Weightlifting Federation, only recognizes records set in world, continental and Olympic competitions.

UANGZHOU, Monday