Champion wrestler Sushil Kumar to miss Asian Games
Indian wrestler Sushil Kumar has opted not to take part in next month's Asian Games in Guangzhou, China.
The defending world champion in the men's freestyle 66kg class said he wants to fully recover from the injuries he sustained in the world championships and the recent Commonwealth Games in New Delhi.
"The worlds is a very tough competition and immediately after, I started preparing for Delhi. I didn’t end up getting much recovery time. I need to do this because I have to be fully fit for next season,
which includes Olympic qualifiers," said the 27-year-old, the first Indian wrestler to win a gold medal in the annual FILA World Wrestling Championships.
"Peaking thrice in a year and giving the best in all tournaments is really a tough ask. We want to give Sushil some time to rest. The Olympic qualifiers are more important for us, keeping in mind the London
Olympics," a national coach said.
The Indian wrestling team will definitely miss the services of Sushil, who is also the reigning Commonwealth Games and Asian champion.
Pardeep Kumar will replace Sushil in the Guangzhou-bound squad. The other new faces in the freestyle team are Ram Bir (84kg), Mousam Khatri (96kg) and Rajiv Tomar (120kg).
The Wrestling Federation of India did not make any changes from the Greco-Roman team that competed in the recent Commonwealth Games in New Delhi.
Indian wrestlers won 10 gold, five silver and four bronze medals in the Commonwealth Games. Aside from Sushil, the other Indian gold medallists in the freestyle events were Yogeshwar Dutt (60kg) and Narsingh
Yadav (74kg).
The winners in the Greco-Roman category were Rajender Kumar (55kg), Ravinder Singh (60kg), Sanjay Kumar (74kg) and Anil Kumar (120kg). Geeta Devi (55kg), Alka Tomar (59kg) and Anita Tomar (67kg) were the
Indian winners in the women's freestyle events.
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