Olympic silver medallist Ravi Dahiya fails trials, won’t go to Asian Games

Ravi Dahiya was unable to secure his qualification to the Asian Games after failing trials.

Atish Todkar secured a massive upset and shocked the wrestling community in India by pulling off a sensational win and knocking out Olympic silver medallist Ravi Dahiya. Todkar’s pin was outrageously good and took Dahiya by surprise. However, it was unflappable Aman Sehrawat, who won the 57kg trials to qualify for the Asian Games on Sunday.

It wasn’t just the shock result that Todkar secured over Ravi Dahiya that shocked people, but the manner in which he went about his game and how he thoroughly dominated his more experienced counterpart. The scorecard reading an unbelievable 20-8 and a 'win by fall' for diminutive Todkar left the spectators, the coaches, the referees, everyone present inside the main hall, stunned.

Todkar was able to use his pace and reflexes well and he dodged several moves attempted by Dahiya well. He moved swiftly from under his opponent’s arms to move back for take-down moves.

Dahiya had a small 6-4 lead going into the second period but from there it was one-way traffic. Two consecutive takedowns and a four-pointer from the edge of the mat that Todkar pulled off had rattled Dahiya.

The Olympic medallist then decided to go for a pin using all his might but he failed to make it count. Todkar managed to wriggle out and then got himself into a position from where he had his opponent's shoulders on the mat.

Dahiya's support staff team said he had recently recovered from a knee injury and lacked mat-time to be performing at his best.

"Ravi had suffered both ACL and MCL tears in his right knee on February 6. We started training early April and he began practising full throttle about 10 days back. He needed competition and lack of it, hurt him," Dr. Munesh Kumar, who looked after Dahiya's rehabilitation told PTI.

However, despite his stellar win over Ravi Dahiya, Todkar was unable to make it count, losing to Rahul by technical superiority in the semi-final.

He was unable to make much of an impact against Rahul, who successfully employed the move after taking a 4-0 lead to end the bout early in the second period.

Asian Games champion Aman Sehrawat, meanwhile, looked a bit wobbly at the beginning of his bout as his opponent Rahul Aware scored an impressive four-pointer against him but the calm and composed Chhatrasal trainee remained unperturbed to win 9-6.

He followed that up with wins by technical superiority against Ankit and Shubham. In the final too, he remained his self with his speed, technique and strategy pushing him to an easy win.

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