CHENNAI: Vinesh Phogat defeated Canada's Diana Mary Helen Weicker 4-0 to retain 53kg gold at the Matteo Pellicone Ranking Series in Rome on Saturday.
This was Vinesh's second gold in a week after she finished first at the XXIV Outstanding Ukrainian Wrestlers and Coaches Memorial in Kyiv last Sunday. Earlier, Sarita Mor won 57kg silver and Greco-Roman wrestler Kuldeep Malik bagged bronze in 72kg.
India had secured three bronze medals in the Greco-Roman category on Friday. Vinesh, the only woman wrestler from the country to qualify for the Tokyo Olympics so far, started with a 4-0 win against compatriot Nandini Salokhe.
She then entered the semifinal as her second opponent was injured while the third one forfeited the bout. The Haryana wrestler registered a victory by fall (4-0) over Samantha Leigh Stewart of Canada to enter final.
Compatriot Nandini, however, lost the bronze medal bout 6-0 to Samantha. Meanwhile, Sarita, the Asian champion, defeated Kazakhstan's Altynay Satylgan 4-1 in the quarterfinal and then beat Emma Tissina of Kazakhstan by a fall in the semifinal. She, however, went down to 2-4 to Giullia Penalber of Brazil in the title bout.
Sakshi's last-minute withdrawal Interestingly, India had gone unrepresented in the 62kg of women's wrestling in the event.
Reason: Sonam Malik had withdrawn due to a head injury while Sakshi had ruled herself out at the last minute. And the consequence was Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) had to pay 500 euros (around Rs 43,000) to the organisers.
Earlier, as many as four wrestlers including Sonam had opted out of the event, but they communicated their decisions to the federation in time helping the latter to withdraw their names from the series.
Sakshi's late intimation meant the WFI was left with no option other than paying the lodging and boarding expenses to the organisers.
"We were apprised of the decision (Sakshi's withdrawal) only a few hours before the wrestlers boarded the flight," a WFI official told this daily. Incidentally, Sonam got injured while training with Sakshi at the national camp last Saturday. The other wrestlers to withdraw were Ravi Dahiya (57kg), Jitender Kinha (74kg) and Deepak Punia (86kg).