Key Points

Esha's podium finish helped India earn their first medal at Ningbo meet, the fourth and final ISSF WC tournament of the year for pistol and rifle shooters, as per Olympics.com.

None of the other Indian shooters could make it to the finals in any events or categories during the first four days before Esha and Rhythm Sangwan made it to the medal match for the women's pistol final on Saturday.

Rhythm (578 - 22x) and Esha (578 - 16x) were the final two players to make it to the medal match, finishing ninth and tenth during the qualifiers. Also, another Indian, Palak, topped the qualification round, but was playing for Ranking Points Only (RPO).

Rhythm secured the fifth spot in the medal match, but Esha managed a brilliant comeback from qualifiers to take home the gold with 242.6 points, edging out China's Yao Qianxun by 0.1 points. Things boiled down to the final shot, with Esha managing 10.5, while Yao got 10.4 points. Olympic record holder Oh Yejin of South Korea completed the podium with a bronze medal.

It is Esha's first-ever individual gold medal in any ISSF World Cup event, having got the silver for the same category way back in 2022 at Cairo and had to settle for silver in 25 m pistol variant in Argentina earlier this year.

The win also saw India sweep all four World Cup gold medals in women's events this year. Suruchi Singh had claimed the gold in Buenos Aires, Lima and Munich.

Coming to the men's 25 m pistol event, none of the Indian shooters made it to the medal match, with Bhavesh Shekhawat and Pradeep Singh Shekhawat finishing 22nd and 23rd, respectively in the qualifiers.

India's Paris Olympics 2024 bronze medalist Swapnil Kusale will be in action in the men's 50 m rifle 3 positions event on Sunday, which marks the final day of the competition. Meanwhile, the double Olympic medalist at Paris, Manu Bhaker, is not competing at the event.

- ANI