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Olympic bronze medallist Bajrang Punia (65kg) suffered a massive upset defeat in the quarterfinals at the Wrestling World Championships in Belgrade. He was knocked out of the gold medal race while Sagar Jaglan will fight for bronze in the 74kg category.
The two-time Commonwealth Games champion Bajrang suffered a loss by technical superiority (10-0) against 23-year-old Yianni Diakomihalis of the USA in the 65kg quarterfinal fixture. The 28-year-old Indian has won three World Championship medals and will now hope that the two-time cadet world champion Diakomihalis reaches the final which would allow him to get a shot at a bronze medal through the repechage.
Earlier in the Wrestling World Championships, Bajrang Punia took down Alejandro Enrique Valdes Tobier from Cuba on the basis of points (5-4) in the pre-quarterfinals. The 18-year-old Sagar Jaglan continued his bronze medal run in the 74kg category as he defeated Suldkhuu Olonbayar of Mongolia 7-3.
The World under-20 bronze medallist will take on Yones Aliakbar Emamichoghaei of Iran in the bronze medal match. In the 97kg event, Vicky lost his qualification round fight against Samuel Scherrer of Switzerland 2-2. He is now out of the medal contention with Pankaj (61kg), who also suffered an opening round exit after going losing to Assyl Aitakyn of Kazakhstan.
Whereas, Vinesh Phogat on Wednesday became the first Indian woman to win two medals at the World Wrestling Championships as she won the bronze in 53kg by defeating Emma Jonna Malmgren of Sweden. The 28-year-old had also won the bronze in the 2019 edition in Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan.