KUMARI not in India’s Shanghai squad

It means the recurve women’s podium will be welcoming some new faces this year – especially considering this news about Deepika KUMARI comes just days after we reported that Olympic Champion KI Bo Bae won’t represent Korea in 2014.

At a national ranking tournament that doubled as selection for this year’s first World Cup stage at Shanghai, KUMARI ranked first after qualification but lost to Jharkhand N LAVANYA in the quarterfinals. LAVANYA went on to win the tournament and her first international cap for India.

KUMARI has been one of the most successful archers on the World Cup tour in recent times. As well as the run of three silvers in a row at Finals, she has picked up five individual medals at stages in three years – and countless gongs in the team and mixed team competitions.

Post by Deepika Kumari.

The 19-year-old archer, who has over 220,000 followers on Facebook, has been recovering from a wrist injury since Paris at the end of last season, and will go back home to train with regional coaches for a month following this setback, according to the Indian Express.

We could still see Deepika at Medellin, though. The Indian Archery Association is considering sending a proven team of KUMARI, Bombayla DEVI and Dola BANERJEE – who also both missed the cut – to the second stage of this year’s tour to keep their confidence up ahead of the Asian Games in Incheon, the Times of India reported.

Rahul BANERJEE beat Tarundeep RAI in the recurve men’s final at the competition. The pair will be joined in Shanghai by their Olympic teammate Jayanta TALUKDAR, and newcomer Vishwas.

“The competition was intense,” Rahul told the Times. “It was quite windy and all archers found it difficult to keep their arrows on the target. Some even ended up hitting the 5 or 6.”

At this early stage in the season, it would be wrong to write off KUMARI’s chances of winning a fifth consecutive World Cup Final berth. For that to happen in 2014, though, she’ll have to get herself back on the Indian team first.