Jostling for medals begins with archery's first quarterfinals

Jostling for medals begins with archery's first quarterfinals London – 1 September 2012   The first quarterfinals of the archery competition get under way in the afternoon session on Saturday September 1, with the fight for semifinal places in women's and men's recurve W1/W2 matches looking to be closely contested.   The last elimination rounds of the competition, men and women's recurve standing classes, will be in the morning. The quarterfinals for both will play out on Sunday.   Recurve Men Standing After setting a Paralympic record in Thursday's ranking round, to the delight and surprise of his home crowd, Kenny ALLEN (GBR) will be watching closely as those without byes in the men's recurve standing battle it out in the last-16 matches. He will face either Zafer KORKMAZ (TUR), the world No.19, or KIM Yong Ok (KOR), world No.63, in the afternoon's last-eight session.   Also competing in the last-16 morning matches is Mario ESPOSITO (ITA), who narrowly missed out on a medal in Beijing 2008 and is ranked 28th in the world. He will face Eric BENNETT (USA), who finished 11th in Thursday's ranking round.   The top three-ranked recurve standing archers in the world, Timur TUCHINOV (RUS), Matthias ALPERS (GER) and Alexandre LASVENES (FRA) all benefit from byes straight into their last-eight matches. Amongst those hoping to win their last-16 matches and join them there are world No.7, KIM Suk Ho (KOR) and No.8 Oleg SHESTAKOV (RUS).   Winners from the last-eight competition will meet in the quarterfinals on Sunday.   Recurve Women Standing The women's recurve standing elimination matches see 13 archers with byes straight into the last-eight. Only six archers will shoot in the last-16 competition: world No.12 Brigitte DUBOC (FRA) will meet No.18 Grazyna WOJCIECHOWSKA (POL), Leigh WALMSLEY (GBR) will face non-ranked Iranian Zahra JAVANMARD, and Germany's Katherina SCHETT will shoot against Lee FORD (USA).   Similar to the men's competition, three of the 13 archers heading straight into the last eight are the top three in the world; Magali COMTE (SUI), who finished 12th in Thursday's ranking round, Irina BATOROVA (RUS), who finished 10th, and GAO Fangxia (CHN) who goes into the last-eight playoffs ranked first. Also going straight through to the last-eight competition is Beijing 2008 gold medallist LEE Hwa Sook (KOR), who ranked fourth on Thursday.   Recurve Men W1W2 Shock knockouts in the men's recurve W1/W2 elimination rounds on Friday have resulted in a dramatically different quarterfinals play-off field than had been expected. World No.2 Piotr SAWICKI (POL) was defeated by Great Britain's Paul BROWNE, who will go on to face world No.3 TSENG Lung Hui (TPE) in his quarterfinal match. Beijing 2008 gold medallist CHENG Changjie (CHN), who ranked third in the qualification stages, was knocked-out by SANAWI Hasihin (MAS), who is No.22 in world rankings.   Iranian archer Ebrahim RANJBARKIVAJ continues his dominance of his class and looks likely to go through to Monday's semifinals after meeting teammate Roham SHAHABIPOUR in the quarterfinal.   Recurve Women W1W2 Despite the 2011 para world champion XIAO Yanhong (CHN) being knocked out in her last-eight elimination round, the field going into the women's recurve W1/W2 quarterfinals on Saturday is incredibly strong, including 2008 Paralympic gold medallist Gizem GIRISMEN (TUR), who will face world record-holder and world No.3 Zahra NEMATI (IRI).   There will be high expectations that at least one Turkish archer will make it through to the semifinals, with world No.1 Ozlem Hacer KALAY and No.2 Hatice BAYAR both taking to the finals field for their quarterfinal draws.   Compound Men W1 Beijing 2008 medallist John CAVANAGH (GBR) returns to the finals field for the quarterfinals where he will meet world No.2 ranked Jeff FABRY (USA). World No.1 and ranking round No.1 David DRAHONINSKY (CZE) will get his first chance to shoot a match on Saturday in the opening quarterfinal of the category against Fabio AZZOLINI (ITA).   Canadian Norbert MURPHY faces Peter KINIK (SVK) and teammates Jean-Pierre ANTONIOS (FIN) and Osmo KINNUNEN (FIN) will also compete for a place in the semifinals.   Source: PNS Edited by World Archery Communication