New Delhi [India], July 22 : Wrestling trials for Asian Championship 2023 for the women’s and Greco-Roman wrestlers are underway at the IGI stadium in Delhi while the next day July 23is reserved for the men’s freestyle wrestling bouts.
Trials will be conducted in all 18 Olympic weight categories - six each for women’s and men’s freestyle and men's Greco-Roman - which will be contested at the upcoming Asian Games.
The IOA-appointed ad hoc panel of WFI gave direct entries to the nation's top wrestlers, Bajrang Punia and Vinesh Phogat, into the Asian Games, which infuriated the whole Indian wrestling community.
However, the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) ad-hoc committee, currently in charge of managing day-to-day affairs of the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI), said in a circular that it has already selected the wrestlers in men’s freestyle 65kg and women’s 53kg.
The exemption means that the two wrestlers will get a direct entry to the Indian squad for the 2023 Asian Games, which is scheduled from September 23 to October 8 in Hangzhou, the People’s Republic of China.
In the men's 65kg division, Olympic medalist Bajrang Punia is India's top wrestler, and in the women's 53kg division, world champion and Commonwealth Games champion Vinesh Phogat is the undisputed champion.
Last week, Phogat travelled to Hungary to compete in the Budapest Ranking Series, but he was forced to withdraw due to sickness at the last minute. She is at present studying abroad.
In the meantime, Punia is receiving training in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. In a training camp in the United States are Sakshi Malik and her spouse Satyawart Kadiyan.
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